Welcome to Exploring the Bible. Just a quick note, our name for this ministry is Exploring the Bible Ministries, and we'll give you more information on that as we go along, but we were just going with the term Exploring the Bible. But this will be prior to this, but this is going to be our official name going forward. So welcome tonight to, I think this is like 15, 14 or 15 weeks that we went in James and now we're in chapter three, verses 13 to 18. So we are exploring the book of James. If you were not here previously, we have these videos on our website. They're also on a YouTube channel. And some of them are on Facebook, not all of them. So if you want to catch up, you can do that. I want to start by saying Happy New Year. A little late, I know. Seven days ago, it was the New Year. But Happy New Year to you. And since we're talking about New Year, I want to ask you the question everybody asks. Have anybody made a New Year's resolution this year? Raise your hand. You guys. That's kind of where I'm at on the whole thing. And the rest of these folks are afraid I'm gonna ask them what it was, so they're not raising their hand, or else they didn't make one. But let me share with you, according to a survey done by an organization with the name of Statista, And by the way, it was done on October 24th and November 3rd. I don't know how anybody knows their New Year resolution three months in advance or two months in advance, but they did this survey. They came up with the number one most resolved, I guess you would call it, most utilized or most people made this resolution. Anybody have a guess what it was? What? I think that's on the list, but that's number four. Anybody want to take another guess at number one? What? That also is on the list somewhere. Number three. Number one, save more money. Who said that? Tracy. You win the gold star for tonight. Saving money, number one, 21% have that on their list. Eating healthier was number two. Exercising number three, losing weight number four, spending more time with family number five. And I guess we'll stop at that. But here's the thing I want you to think about. Just thinking about that list of five, saving money, eating healthier, exercising, losing weight, spending more time with family, all good things, right? What's not on the list? That's what I want to ask you. What is not on the list that should be on the list? Okay, that would be a good one. Anybody else have an idea? Well, we can just stop with that because anything of a spiritual nature for those of us who serve the Lord and you know, try to be a witness for him and to bring glory to him. There should be something spiritual on the list. And I think that's whatever it is that we feel like we need to improve on should be number one. So with that thought in mind, let's talk about godly wisdom. Being wise is something that ought to be on our list, perhaps. And that's our topic tonight. Title, Wising Up in a Down World, James 3, 13 to 18. Now what we're gonna learn and the basis for all that we're gonna say tonight begins with the fact that there are two competing wisdoms in this world. Two different types of wisdoms that are competing for our allegiance. Two different philosophies of life. the wisdom of God and the wisdom of the world. Now, we can all agree we ought to live by God's wisdom. However, that's easier said than done. God's way of thinking is often blotted out by the noise of the world. We're bombarded daily with the world's ideas, the world's viewpoints, and they all conflict with God's wisdom. So, not easy to keep our minds focused and unspotted from the world, but it is important. Now, for those of you that were here last time, I think that was about 30 days ago, the seventh day of December, I believe. And we talked about the tongue, which is the previous topic here in chapter three. And obviously, we need to be wise in the way we use our tongue. No doubt about that. And there are some that feel like that's the whole context of verses 13 to 18. I tend to think it's a more general nature. Obviously it connects with what he just said, but he's talking about wisdom in general in these verses. We've noticed these reoccurring themes in the book of James. It keeps coming back and expanding on those themes. Trials and testing in chapter one. Wisdom. beginning in chapter one, verse five, verse eight, there's a segment in there. Again, he starts in James one, two to four, testing, goes to James one, five to eight, wisdom. Then he goes to James one, nine to 11, poverty and wealth. Then he goes back and he starts through the cycle again. Now the cycles don't always occur in exact sequence, but tonight we are talking about wisdom and we have been in this section of wisdom from chapter 2 verse 14 on to where we will end tonight, chapter 3 and verse 18. So this is not the first time he's talked about wisdom. And the first thing he taught us, first thing that James says I'm a little trouble with my remote here. There we go. The first thing he said about wisdom is back in chapter one, verse five. He says, if any man lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives liberally. I mean, meaning that he's more than willing to give it out. who gives liberally and without reproach, doesn't reprimand us, doesn't criticize us for needing it, dispenses it when we pray, let him ask. Now, there's two things we need to remember that we found out about this verse. Number one, it begins with a conditional. clause at the beginning. If any of you lacks, but this particular condition in the original language always assumes that what he is stating is true. So basically James is saying we all need it. We can assume that from the start. So it could actually be translated, I suppose, since we all lack wisdom. The next thing we need to notice in this verse is the verb, let him ask, is present tense, and it is an imperative, which means it's a command. He doesn't say, you know, anytime you feel like you might need a little wisdom, pray. He's telling us we ought to be seeking wisdom all the time. It's an obligation, it's a responsibility given to us by God. Now, that's basically all he said about it now. until he comes to chapter two, verse 14, where he took up this section on wisdom. And tonight we come to chapter three, verses 13 to 18. So his point in chapter three is that we should make sure that God's wisdom is governing our lives. What is wisdom, by the way? Well, wisdom, and we're gonna get into more of this as we move through this tonight, but wisdom is not knowledge. Wisdom might have to do with how we use our knowledge. It certainly should be. But wisdom is not about getting smarter. It's not about our IQ. It's not about our education. It's about utilizing the principles that God teaches us, beginning in particular with the book of Proverbs, where he tells us much about wisdom and the other wisdom books in the Old Testament. James is often referred to as wisdom literature, which is much akin to what we find in the book of Proverbs. And wisdom should govern our lives, our choices, our morality, our obedience, our relationships, all governed by the wisdom of God. And there are two principles we're gonna notice in verses 13 to 18 that we need to take note of and apply to our everyday life. And they're very simple. The first one is this, you gotta reject worldly wisdom. You can't mix the two. It's not a pick and choose. It's not eclectic. You need to reject the world's wisdom. And if you don't do that, you can't really live by God's wisdom and let it govern your life. So what does he say? He says, first of all, that pride is the root of worldly wisdom. That's why it should be rejected. Pride is the root, the basis, the foundation. And so he says, who is wise and understanding among you, let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. Now the word translated meekness here could be translated humility. Meekness and humility are very close. But contextually here, you look at things like the, what we would call a dictionary in English, a lexicon for the Greek, you'll find out that this word can be translated humility. And that helps us because when we think of meekness, we have trouble defining that, but we all know what humility is. So what is humility, or meekness for that matter? It is the opposite of pride. The opposite of pride. So if we're understanding, we should be demonstrating a life before others, showing forth our life, setting forth an example of humility, not pride. That's different than the world's concept. Number two, envy and strife are the result of the world's wisdom. If there's envy and strife in your life that you cause, there's always gonna be strife or conflicts with other people we don't cause, but if we're controlled by envy, if we're dominated by a jealous, envious spirit, and we apply that in our relationships, we're causing strife. So envy and strife will result if you're prideful. So two reasons so far why we'd need to reject worldly wisdom. And he says this in verse 14, but if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. Well, boasting goes along with being prideful. It's amazing how many times you can just watch the news or turn on a program on TV or just listen to people talking at work, at school, wherever you may be. They pride themselves in these kinds of things, being envious, self-seeking, and much, much more. J. I. Packer said it this way, and I think it's well said here. He says, Envy is one of the most cancerous and soul-destroying vices there is. It is terribly potent, for it feeds and is fed by pride, the taproot of the fallen nature. The taproot of the fallen nature, I think that sums it up well. So we all deal with the fact that because we are sinful, we were born sinners, and we're not gonna be able to change that, the way the Lord will change that when he comes back. But we have to fight that battle and make sure that we do not yield to that natural inclination to be envious or jealous. And we all are, we all deal with it. We don't talk about it in Christian circles very much. But we all know it's there. And when it rears its ugly head, we gotta put it away. Make sure it does not translate into our actions or our words. Now, here's another quote from Andrew Murray. He says, a humble man feels no jealousy or envy. Humility, the opposite of pride. Feels no jealousy or envy. He can praise God when others are preferred and blessed before him. He can bear to hear others praised while he is forgotten because he has received the spirit of Jesus who pleased not himself and who sought not his own honor. Now, that's when Jesus humbled himself, became a man, became incarnate. Obviously, God is due all of our glory and he expects us to glorify him. But Christ submitted himself. To be a servant when he came now, that's what James is referring to James knew well James observed it He didn't necessarily believe it all Early on but at some point he did believe probably after the resurrection Probably when the Lord appeared to him after the resurrection. And, of course, we discussed who James was, the half-brother of Jesus Christ, the head pastor or elder, whatever you want to call him, the leader of the church at Jerusalem once it was established. Of course, the apostles were in the beginning. One third thing we observe about the worldly wisdom that we deal with every day, it's demonic. The source of worldly wisdom is demonic. Now that sounds like a strong statement that a preacher would make to get your attention, but this is scripture. This wisdom does not descend from above, says James in verse 15, but it is earthly. It didn't come down from God. This is not spatial so much as he's indicating the two realms. Wisdom does not descend from above but is earthly. It came about here, on this created world. It's sensual. It's all about your senses. It's all about your desires. It's all about your jealousy, your self-seeking, all those things that are a part of that sinful nature we battle. And ultimately, the source is demonic. You see, we think the source of the things we hear in this world is people, you know, whatever we hear. Some person came up with it. It's some movement, some idea. All you got to do is look around in our society today. And we do it all the time as believers. We say, how did we get to this point? How did we get to the point where perversion is thought to be normal and pushed upon us? And there's all kinds of perversion, whatever, you can go in any direction you want. But it's not something that originated in the heart of man without Satan's influence. So he is the original source. Look at this in scripture. 1 Corinthians 3 verse 19, the first part of the verse. Paul says, for the wisdom of the world is foolishness with God. Now, when Paul says it's foolishness, that word, he's using it like it's used in the Old Testament, like in the book of Proverbs. To be a fool doesn't mean you're just devoid of knowledge or understanding or you're silly, but it indicates somebody that rejects God. has hardened their heart against God. So the wisdom of the world is that. It is opposite. It is contrary to the wisdom of God. It is a rejection and a hardening of one's heart toward it. Now let's go back to the original source of it all, as far as humanity is concerned, in Genesis 3.6. We know that Satan first approached Eve, And he said, you know, basically God's kind of treating you poorly and restricting you and so forth, and planted that idea in Eve's mind. Eve even, you know, when she responds to Satan, says, you know, God told us we shouldn't eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and we shouldn't touch it. Now, God never said that. Probably a good idea they not touch it, because then they might eat it, but God hadn't said that. And you can just see the wheels turning in their mind as she begins to take the bait that Satan puts before her, that God somehow is holding back on all that he could do for you that would make your life better. So it's an insidious lie. And we come to verse six and it says, so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, okay, to satisfy her sensual desires, it was pleasant to the eyes, something she wanted to possess, materialism, and a tree desirable to make one wise. That's pride, human wisdom. It all began with the first sin. And the source of that, I know, Adam and Eve had to choose to eat of the fruit of the tree. That's true. But Satan is the one who introduced the temptation. So the world's wisdom is literally demonic. We have three great reasons then to reject it. Not only should we reject worldly wisdom, but the opposite is incumbent upon us. We need to follow God's wisdom. And that's what we find when we come now to verse 17. The first thing we wanna do though is back up to verse 13 one more time and just reference the fact that the essence of God's wisdom is humility. And that's what he told us back in verse 13 when he called it the humility of wisdom or the meekness of wisdom, the opposite of pride. So the essence of God's wisdom founded on humility, not pride, not what we can do or what we want to do, but that we are to be submissive to God and humble. and obedient. But now the focus, the focus that we come to now in verse 17 of godly wisdom is relational. Now, stick with me on this. Relational. Let's look at the verse. But the wisdom that is from above, God's wisdom, is first and peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits without partiality and without hypocrisy. This is the new King James here. So might be a little bit different than if you've memorized it, but what I want you to do is look at that list. Think about what you're seeing in that list. I'm not talking about what's in the list. I'm not talking about the individual components of the list. Well, what is it that's key to understanding what James is saying here? Do you see it? Those commentaries you pick up will give you the list and they'll explain what it means to be peaceable in general. I don't think we really need to spend our time defining that. What we really need to understand is how do they connect? What is common about everything said there? Now do you see it? It's all about what we do in relation to other people, what we say to other people, how we treat other people. It's relational. We want to be peaceable with other people. One is Paul saying Galatians five, but the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, and so on. Gentleness is in that list. It's even called good fruits here. There's a definite connection. Here's an example of what I'm talking about. I did not put this on screen because that's a lot of verses to put up there. It'll be really small print and then you'll all be distracted trying to, but you don't need to read it. I wish you would read it, go back and read it. You don't have to read it right now. It's the story of Solomon. Solomon was in a position after becoming king in David's stead that God would, said, you know, what do you want? And Solomon said, I need wisdom. A very wise decision. God gave him great wisdom. By the way, what did we learn in James 1.5? We get wisdom by requesting wisdom from God. It doesn't mean that we dispense with all of our experience, but we do have the Word of God, and His helping us understand the Word of God and how it applies in our daily life is all about receiving that wisdom. and other people can even help us see it, but it comes in conjunction with and through the Word of God. But in 1 Kings 3, 16 to 18, right after we learn that God has given Solomon great wisdom, we have this situation where two women come before Solomon, who's not only the king, but serving as a judge, as a civil authority, and there's two women and one child, and they both say the child is their child. Now, we don't need to go into all the circumstances of how this may have happened. It could well be that they were both prostitutes. There doesn't seem to be a husband or a man in the picture here. The one woman, says that the other woman rolled over on her child, and the child died in the middle of the night, and now she came and slipped in and took her child, and she's evidently in possession of the child, and Solomon is tasked with trying to figure out whose child it is, and we know the story, we've read it, we understand it. He said, well, let's just take a sword, and we'll cut the child in half, and we'll give each half. Now, that sounds like a really barbaric suggestion, that I suggest to you that it was a wise application. Well, we know it was wise because it worked out well, right? The mother says, oh no, don't do that, and the envious woman says, yeah, that'd be great. If I can't have the child, she's not gonna have the child. What is that, envy? Jealousy, pride, you just go down the list. But the true mother, spare the child. Don't do that, give her the child. What is Solomon doing? He is introducing the relational aspect to the situation. He understood the true mother would not sacrifice the child, obviously, And his goal is to make sure the mother, the real mother, whichever one it is, has the child. That's the good. That's what's best. That's God's wisdom. And he does what he does to accomplish that result. He exercises wisdom in a situation, in a circumstance, that brings about what is right or righteous and just. So it's a great biblical example of what we're talking about. The focus is relational. The result is peace. The result is peace. And again, this is not a result that brings peace because you walked into a room. It's not even a result that brings about peace because you're a peacemaker, although we should be that. But it brings peace to us, first of all and foremost. It brings us a life of peace. So go back to the fruit of the Spirit again. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace. and long suffering and the rest of the night. So let's look at the verse. Let's continue on to verse 18. Now the fruit, interesting he uses that term, this is twice he's used that term. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. We sow peace to the situation. We bring about peace in other people's lives by the application of wisdom, but we can't guarantee that because they have got to respond in the right way. But if we are sowing peace, there's a good chance we're making peace. And if we're sowing peace, we have to have peace before we can sow it. We have to be in a right relationship with God. The fruit of the spirit must be present in our life. I suggest to you that peace, personal peace, the peace of God, we have peace with God positionally because we're saved, but the peace of God, that's dependent upon us yielding to the Spirit, His direction, that the fruit of the Spirit then might become a part of our life. I don't know if you do this, but, well, I do know you do the first part of it like me. You lose peace sometimes. we become irritable. And other people don't like to be around a swimmer like that. And then when they point it out, we'll make excuses. So we all deal with that. But when I find myself irritable, not every time, I can't lie, my wife's here. But There are times when I catch myself and I memorize the fruit of the spirit and I'll go over them in my mind. It's just that stop and pausing and noting to myself to let the spirit have control, peace will replace stress, irritation, fear, all the rest. Thomas A. Kempis years ago said, the more humble a man is in himself and the more obedient towards God, the wiser will he be in all things and the more his soul shall be at peace. So the wisdom of God is pretty important to us and our relationship with God, to our other relationships, our human relationships as well. So, reject worldly wisdom, follow God's wisdom. By the way, I wanna back up something I wanted to mention here. Gotta go back a ways. I gotta go all the way back to the beginning, so I thought one would be right there. But in the beginning of our study, back in verse 13, he says, what? Show. Remember that? We need to show. our wisdom. I'll get back to where we was, okay. So let me read it to you. Verse 13, who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. The word translated show can also be translated prove. It's used in that sense. It's a secondary meaning of the word in the lexicon and it always references James 3.13. But the thing I want you to note here is the word show is again one of those imperatives. It's a command. It's not good enough to have wisdom. We have to employ our wisdom. It's not good enough to understand what God's wisdom is. We have to also exhibit it. And again, that connects with the whole relational aspect of it. So let's wind things up. My wife found this for me. She does a lot of my research, provides me with a lot of my wisdom. It came from a site called Today in the World. I don't know anything about it, didn't look it up, but it's quoted on preceptaustin.org. Wise people know how to learn. They never seek knowledge for their own sake. They know how to talk. They speak the truth in love. They know how to act. They pursue justice and evade evil. Perceptive people balance their words and actions. They say and do the right things at the right time for the right reasons. A discerning person realizes that biblical wisdom is more about practice than philosophy. Wise people live skillfully. They apply heavenly counsel to earthly conduct. That's one of the best descriptions of wisdom I've ever read. It's not scripture. That's exactly what James has told us in these verses. So the question is, are we applying the wisdom we have? Do we have wisdom, first of all? Do we know where to get it, God's word? We probably know that. But the problem is we don't apply it like we should. So that's our challenge as we begin the new year. That should be our challenge every day. James is so intensely practical and applicational. James never dwells on theology for theology's sake. It's always connected. Paul does the same thing. It's always connected to what we need to do in our life. So we have to ask ourselves and honestly ask ourselves this point. Am I exhibiting wisdom? Does it show up in my relationships? Can other people see it in my life? So, I've asked you the question. Now, are you ready to answer that? Not to me, no. I don't need to hear whether you do or you don't, but I do know this. We all do not do the right thing and the wise thing very many, many times in our life. So, what do you think? You ready to revise your New Year's revolution and, revolution, resolution? Well, make one. If you've been doing it. Maybe we need to get back to that.