Our scripture reading this evening, we turn to James 1, and we're going to read just the first 18 verses, the first 18 verses of James 1. James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad greeting. My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into diverse temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience, but let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally and abradeth not, and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord. A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted, but the rich in that he is made low, because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away. For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth. The grass and the flower thereof faileth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth. So also shall the rich man fade away in his ways. Blessed is the man. that endureth temptation. For when he has tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him. Let no man say, when he is tempted, I am tempted of God. For God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man. But every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. Then, when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Do not err, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. We read that far in the word of God. And we consider, as our text this morning, or this evening, From the Word of God, verses two through four, my brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into diverse temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience, but let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Beloved in our Lord Jesus Christ, this text that we consider at the very beginning of the book of James is very closely related to the overall idea and theme of the book itself, and therefore it's very important to understanding the text and receiving it to understand really the book itself and where it's coming from. James, that's mentioned here, is generally acknowledged by all that he is the half-brother of our Lord Jesus Christ. A man who, when Jesus was alive, did not believe in him as the Messiah, but came to believe in Christ after the resurrection or the spirit was poured out. As the first verse makes clear, James here is writing to Jewish Christians. Jewish Christians especially, we know from later in the book, that were scattered abroad by the persecution that happened in Jerusalem and really began with the Apostle Paul. Paul himself participated in that persecution, of course, later repented, and was called to be the great missionary to the Gentiles. The book is filled with all sorts of admonitions like we consider this evening in verses 2 through 4, but it's really pastoral in its nature. If you examine the book very carefully, you're going to discover there's many, many similarities to the teachings of Jesus himself. Many references to the teachings of Jesus that are found in the book. And James himself identifies himself as the servant of Jesus Christ and speaks to an audience that he will call brethren some 15 times. So it's what we call a practical book, a very practical book. It deals with what we call orthopraxy, how one lives. It's often called the Proverbs of the New Testament. And its main idea, its main theme is to set forth the life of true faith in Jesus Christ and do that over against a false faith, a dead faith. So it's a book about how religion is practice, that it's a religion, even in the first chapter that we did not read, of doing the Word, not merely hearing the Word, of living in love with Jesus Christ, and that is a true and living faith. Now our text, addresses really the very first practical situation in which faith is exercised, where a living faith comes to the foreground, where a living faith shows itself when ye fall into diverse temptations. And it's really remarkable and, of course, important, significant, that the apostle James begins here. He begins here because, well, first of all, this is the very thing the Christians to whom he writes are experiencing at the moment. But as the apostle's going to make clear, that this isn't just some strange thing, some rare thing, Something the other apostles also have to emphasize, Peter and Paul and John himself, but We may begin here because this really characterizes the life of all Christians. The text tonight doesn't speak to some rare Christians, some Christians way back then, or even a few scattered individuals here, but really sets forth the life of all Christians. So it's good to start there. It constitutes the Christian life. Beside that, It really sets forth as a concrete example of how living faith works and the means the Holy Spirit uses to strengthen and exercise faith so that it endures to the end. So we learn, even here, much about faith, how it operates, how it acts as a living thing. And in this text, we learn that faith is operative in all the faculties of the soul. It's located in the heart, but exactly because it's in the heart, faith operates through all the faculties, and you will see that in this text when he talks about receiving trials and temptations with joy. Joy is something in the heart, an attitude in the heart. But he also goes on to make clear that it involves a certain reasoning of the mind. This joy comes from knowing something, knowing something by faith. And then we learn that it involves the will also, that what we are called to do is moved by a desire to be whole and complete, it's moved toward a certain goal. So we're going to consider, really, that is the skeleton of the sermon. Consider with me, counting trials, all joy, and then the attitude, first of all, secondly, the reason, what is the mind reason, and finally, that goal, that goal that the will desires of a true and living faith. We'll begin with the attitude. The Apostle here exhorts all Christians, not just the Jewish Christians to whom he writes, that when certain things happen, we must count or reckon them to be joy, that is, to receive them with joy. And the things that happen that we are to count or receive with joy are when we fall into divers tem We have to first understand here what exactly the Apostle is talking about, and we need to do that because, well, even the Apostle himself is going to use the words trial or temptations in different senses. We have to be aware that even when we read the Holy Scriptures, and we have to do that because we associate the word temptation with sin. And we know trials don't necessarily involve sin, can be any kind of affliction. And so sometimes we have to decide what exactly the apostle is talking about. And what we must see here in this passage, this particular passage, is the apostle is trying to be as broad as he possibly can. He calls them temptations. but he's making clear also, he's not talking about the kind of temptations or trials where we fall into sin. It includes that, but it's not exclusive to that. Broadly, the idea of trials or temptations, the words themselves, the thing itself, refers to anything that happens to us that causes sorrow or pain. Sorrow or pain in our body. Sorrow or pain in our soul. And therefore, it puts us to the test. The idea is that our body or soul isn't naturally in pain as such. It doesn't desire pain. It doesn't look for it. The natural state, the desired state of the soul isn't sorrow, it's joy, but there's situations called temptations or trials that bring pain, that bring suffering to the body or the soul. Now, they can be sin, and that's the word that we usually associate with temptations, and that's included here. That's clear from the references that come later. In verse 13, for example, the apostle speaks of temptations and being tempted, and it's clear there that he's focusing on sin itself. That's clear when in verse 13 he says, God doesn't tempt us, neither is God tempted, but a man is tempted when he's drawn away by his own lust, and that lust breaks forth into sin. So it's clear it includes that. But especially what he has in mind is temptations that try us, they tempt us, or they trials for us. And that's clear from the verses that lead up. For example, verse 12, that's what he calls them, goes on to talk about temptations wherein one is tried. And if you want to know the kinds of things he's talking about, you have to go to the verses before that and notice that it includes any matter that might cause our faith to waver like the seas, verse six. It concerns matters of being of high or low degree, being rich or being poor. In other words, the temptations he's talking about in these verses are as broad as you can imagine. sicknesses, loss, persecution, lose a job, could be anything. That's why he uses the word diverse. He adds the word diverse even when he adds the word all so that we think as broadly as possible. We think of all the different many kinds, occasions, and circumstances that constitute those kinds of tests that bring pain and bring sorrow. In fact, he goes on to say, so many that we fall into them. When you first read that, maybe you thought, ah, he has to be talking about sin because we associate that word fall with sin, falling into sin. But that's not the idea here. The idea is that that word literally means to be surrounded or encompassed by, like one falls into a pit, or one is encompassed by thugs. The idea is that you're simply walking by in life. You're walking down the path of life, minding your own business, not particularly getting into trouble, when suddenly, without warning, Really, through no fault of your own, you're encompassed and surrounded or fall into a pit of all kinds of troubles, pain and sorrow. Not necessarily because you sinned. Now, he does use the word temptation for a reason. Because those kinds of circumstances, in one way or another, involve Satan. The Bible talks about Satan's devices. And the idea is that Satan looks for these kinds of situations to move in and to try us and to tempt us. They are used by Satan for his own ends or purposes, regardless of what God is intending. Satan, we know, is the accuser of our brethren in heaven and earth. He uses whatever He can to remind us that we are unworthy. We are unrighteous in ourselves. We don't deserve God's love or His salvation. He uses that. He tries to impress that upon us and uses all circumstances to create doubt. And He does that so that we don't trust in God And trusting in God, of course, is faith. In other words, he wants to stimulate unbelief. He wants to affect unbelief in us. And his goal, then, is to separate us from God, because we are connected to God by faith. See how this involves faith? What joins us to God? Faith. What is faith? Faith is trust. Faith is hope in God. So Satan is always looking for any opportunity he can to interrupt that. to sever that connection and importantly when he does that it also involves separation from others, members of the church who are also united to God, spouses in marriage, parents and children in the family, friendships that we have. He affects by trying to sever or interrupt faith or divide us from God, he causes a whole chain reaction of that. So that's why he uses that word temptation also. We're being tempted there. The idea isn't we've put ourself into this mess because of our own sin, but we need to be aware that in the circumstances we're in, there is a potential to sin. Now, the point is, behind this, is that the apostle is aware that both God and Satan know They know our weaknesses. They know our tendencies. They know the situations where we're the most vulnerable. And that explains that we're diverse too. And why we need to think as broadly as we can. We need to remind ourself these can be situations that are very public. They're situations that are known by others. Maybe we have a cancer, and everybody knows about it, but they could also be private. A crisis that we find only in our soul. No one else really knows. They can be trials, as I said, that create pain and affliction upon our body. Or maybe it's just our soul. Maybe it's our mind. They can be the kinds of diverse trials or temptations that are very brief. Maybe they last, endure only for a short while, maybe an hour. Or they could last hours and days and weeks or maybe our whole lifetime. They can be trials that are related to our physical earthly goods. or could be trials or temptations related to spiritual blessings and virtues. So think as broadly as possible. Anything that brings pain and sorrow. Anything. And that helps us understand too now how broadly the apostle is speaking tonight. Everyone here should be able to relate to that. Now the calling, the attitude that is called for is to count it, count whatever that trial or temptation is, all joy. Now here we see how different biblical joy is from earthly joy. Because you see, earthly wisdom, earthly experience says that's impossible. I mean, how is it possible to be in a situation that's causing sorrow to have joy? How is that possible? Well, the wisdom of God, which is talked about next in the passage, recognizes that difficulty, it does. And that's why the word reckon is used. Reckon. Reckon means to consider it. The situation or the trial, the temptation all by itself may not be joy, but the exact opposite. Unbelievable grief, pain, sorrow, tears, but reckon it or consider it joy, the exact opposite. And it's something in here. When the apostle refers to joy, He's not referring to the kind of joy that we often consider joy. We have a joy at a party, we have a joy at a basketball game, we have joy for this and that, and we don't really consider what biblical joy is. The idea of joy in Scripture is an attitude of peace. You may not even have a great smile on your face and be jumping around with excitement, but there's an attitude of peace. There may be great, great excitement in one's soul. There will be happiness there. But it doesn't necessarily need to be expressed in the body. It's primarily an attitude, and not really an emotion either, as we're going to see. Much that goes for joy is not based upon what the mind thinks, or based upon faith, as we're going to see. This joy is quite a bit different. It's not carnal joy. The reason that needs to be pointed out is because there's earthly wisdom that's similar to this, but it's really quite different. The apostle is calling for something that is more than simply saying, be an optimist. Have a positive outlook in this trial or trouble that you're in. Make lemonade out of the lemons. That's the kind of thing we hear. This isn't the same thing as finding joy in the trial or tribulation because when one looks out, one sees the hope that maybe it's going to go away. Maybe I'll be relieved of it. The apostle isn't saying either have joy afterwards. a cry now and feel the pain now, but joy is not possible now, you're going to have to wait till after that. And let's remember, that's often the kind of comfort that we bring. It could be worse. This too shall pass. They have surgery or medicine for that. This will be replaced with that. The Apostle is saying, in the situation, with the tears strolling down your cheeks, you need to reckon this as a matter of joy. And obviously then the opposite of complaining, groaning about it, being angry or bitter about it, being in despair or hopeless. It's all the exact opposite of that. Though it seems impossible, the apostle here is not calling us to do the impossible. This is coming from a man who himself knew the pain and suffering of trials. More than that, it's coming from Christ. He speaks not for himself, but for Christ, who knew suffering and pain. But even more importantly than that, he's commanding here what faith in Christ does. He's not presenting a possibility. He's not presenting something that only some Christians can do. But he's presenting what faith itself in Christ does. That's why he commands it. Now, with regard to that, to flesh that out a little bit, we ought to see, first of all, that this reckoning, this considering them joy, means you have to reckon something about that. The first thing, the first thing that faith reckons about such trials and troubles, and why we spent some considerable time on it, is that we have to realize they're inevitable. They are. the normal way of life, especially for a Christian. Not just a human being, not just fallen human beings, not just human beings susceptible to disease and death, but this is the way of life for the Christian. How often does the scriptures remind us of that? I mentioned Peter. Beloved, says Peter, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you as though some strange thing happened to you. The Apostle John, in the world ye shall have trouble, tribulation. Be of good cheer. In other words, One of the things that enables faith to have joy in the midst of pain and sorrow is to reckon that this is the lot of our life. Faith has a way of looking at life and realizing this begins as soon as you're born. No sooner are you born and you're crying. You're going to be raised by sinful parents. You're going to have a sinful sibling You learn very quickly you don't get everything that you want. There will be troubles and pain at school with teachers, with classmates. Then there's the teenage years, the pain and sorrows of loneliness, being alone, dating, finding a spouse, trying to figure out what in the world you're going to do in life. Having children, maybe having none. raising the children, and maybe wishing you had none. Then there's all the financial toil and work. We were children, people we loved dying. It never ends. To reckon trials joy, faith first has to recognize that. Oh, there may be others trying to tell you that's not the way it is. The devil likes to do that. You, you've been singled out. You, you, you God has targeted because you're such a bad person and many, many other such things and faith has to say no. The second thing that faith really reckons when it reckons such things, joy, is that there is a role and purpose of God who loves me and cares for me. Now this is true even when sometimes trials and temptations are a correction. There are times that God sends us tremendous trials and tribulations because of our sin. We're being pig-headed, stubborn, and rebellious. We're kicking against the pricks, as Jesus himself said to Paul when he was persecuting his church and killing his people. And God can do that. But even then, it's not because he hates us. In other words, count it joy because it's ordered by God. It's sent by God. It's directed by God. It's used by God for our good. Not to harm us, but to help us. Not to tempt us. but to try us. Not to destroy us, but to save us. And the particular trial, this particular one, is just what the good doctor ordered for you. Who are you going to hear that from? We go and we say, no, that's not what you need. That's not what you should have. Faith says, if I have it, if I'm undergoing it, God sent it. And God sent that particular one. It's not just DNA. It's not just this. It's not just that. It's not even my own stupidity sometimes. But God said, this trial, this tribulation, this sorrow, this pain, you must have. Faith also is able to reckon trials, joy, and all of them, and every aspect of it. This is something else that's really quite amazing. It's one thing to say, reckon some of your temptations to be joy, or maybe even reckon all your temptations to be joy, but reckon them to be all joy. There too. Faith has a way of looking at one's tears and pain in an entirely different way. In other words, even the sorrow, the Bible doesn't come to say don't be sorrowful, don't cry. We have an old Reformed confession that says to not cry at certain times is inhuman. We're supposed to cry, we're supposed to feel pain, we were made that way. That's who we are. We cry as well as rejoice, but the idea of this is even that is good. We're not helping anybody when we go to them and say don't cry. Squash those emotions. Grit your teeth and don't scream out in the pain. No, no. Faith says there's something good about that too. That every aspect and every turn, every part of this, every detail of this, is joy. There's something there. And this is why it is good for us to go visit people in pain and distress. It's not just to bring them comfort. Elders may be able to tell you about this, maybe you can yourself. How often is it when you go to someone in these kinds of trials and troubles, you go away more edified than perhaps they were? And why is that? Because you're seeing faith in action many times, and these people will testify to you what good has come of it. I don't know how many times I've heard someone say, I really didn't know what the communion of the saints was. Oh, I confessed it every Sunday evening, but I really didn't know what it was until I lost my spouse, or I got cancer. And people they didn't know or had never talked to, perhaps didn't even know they were in their church, came out of the woodwork. We don't know. But how many times have you had someone testify where you look at the situation and you just say, I don't know how they're doing it. I don't know what's going on. How do they do this? How do they do that? And it can be anything from paying your school tuition to endure some awful, awful bad things, recovery from a terrible accident. And there's something that happened. There was something there that caused joy. It ought to be the source of joy, at least for faith. Now, it's the next point of the sermon that really gets into that. I've fleshed out a few things, basically, but there's a reason why we're supposed to count trials joy, beyond these things. They're related, but beyond those things. The apostle says, count them joy because the trying of your faith works patience. So follow the logic. When the apostle says, count it all joy, beside the things that I pointed out and mentioned to you, focus on this one thing, that what's going on is that your faith is being tried, it's being tested. Now, this is one of the reasons why so many people don't have joy or can't reckon trials to be joy. And let's admit that. It can be ourselves or maybe others we know in the church. We feel sorry for them or we feel sorry for ourselves. And if you look at bottom, why can't you find joy? Why cannot you see even this thing to be good? The answer often is because we don't think our faith needs to be tried. And we often don't think our faith needs to be tried because we misunderstand the nature of faith. We don't really know what faith is. And that's why, again, the apostle begins here. This whole book is about faith, living faith. What does it look like? How does it act? What does it do? And here we learn something about faith. If faith must be tried, there's reasons for it. And the first is because of the nature of faith itself. Do you know what faith is? Faith is a living, organic instrument. It's living, not dead. It's living. Now we know faith is essentially a bond that unites us to Christ. And by that bond, that instrument, we receive Christ and all his benefits unto salvation. but it's an active living bond. There's a difference. We know all kinds of bonds, like glue. Take two pieces of wood, stick some glue, slap them together, they're stuck, but it's not a living bond. It's not an active bond. Faith is an active living bond. It's not passive, it's not dead, that is non-living. Faith doesn't simply receive Christ passively or like water going through a pipe. But faith actively loves, embraces, believes, knows, and relies on Jesus Christ for salvation. And because it's living, it grows. Now, knowing that, what are two things that are essential for growth? Well, the first one is nutrition, isn't it? And sure enough, we discover that faith needs nutrition. It needs a spiritual diet. And so we talk about eating and drinking Christ at the Lord's Supper, right? He's our nutrition. We talk about the Word. Man not living by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Talking about feeding faith there. But there's more than that. If we think about living organic things that grow, we know something else, which is they don't simply need nutrition, but they need to be exercised. And the kind of exercise is always a form of resistance. So let's take a tree. It's like in faith to a tree. I didn't make that up, the Bible talks about that. You have a tree, it has roots, goes way into the ground, and from that ground it sucks out nutrition, makes it grow, and the tree can grow. But if you want a really strong tree, the kind of tree where the roots are way down in there and the winds blow, that tree can move around, but it will not break, it will not uproot. It's where it's placed. When there's wind that operates against that tree, you find out that all those rings and knots and branches, they all work tightly together, or like your own muscles, like you. We can grow just by eating. But that's not good either, is it? If you want to really grow, be strong, healthy, live long, endure, but you need to exercise. There has to be some resistance to those muscles. Walking, getting around, jogging, lifting weights, athletics, all those things, what are they doing? Well, they're taking those muscles, those instruments, and they're working them. And the more they work, the more they grow, the stronger they get. That's why you should feel sorry for Christians, or why it's such a bad thing when we ourselves think of faith only as some sort of passive union with Jesus Christ. Then you end up with a notion of Christians just as stocks and blocks, inactive, dead, wooden things. And the Bible speaks against that, our creeds speak against that. We receive Christ through this active, organic thing called faith. And that's what lies, underlies this. When you have trials, count them as all joy. Why? Because by them your faith is being tried. I said faith has to be tried in the first place because it's a living, organic thing. Needs to grow. and it grows by nutrition and exercise. And number two, a faith needs to be tried because of our own sinful nature in which faith resides. Faith does not reside in a perfect nature, but it resides in the heart of a person who's prone to evil, who's spiritually in his own heart, has many harmful things there. We can be proud We can become proud of our own gifts and abilities. Paul himself talked about this. God sent me this thorn in the flesh lest I should be proud. Why? Because God showed him things. God showed him heaven. And even Paul, the saint that he was, was in danger of becoming proud. God sent him a thorn in the flesh. We can become proud of the fact that we're very good at child rearing. and then become critical of others that aren't. Proud of our place in the church. And so faith needs to be exercised, and it can be exercised by a trial. The example here, not a bad one, is pig iron. You know what pig iron is? Pig iron is when you go to mine iron ore that's mixed in with all the rocks, the first step of the process is you melt it down, and you suck the iron out of the rock, and you're left with big chunks of just iron. It's iron. But if you know anything about iron, iron's strong, but it's very brittle. You have an iron pipe in your house, it's real easy to hit it with a sledgehammer and just crack it in two. A bridge made of iron doesn't last very long. So even in our own country, we had an iron age, but it wasn't until steel was made that you had skyscrapers. Well, what's going on there? Well, you can take that pig iron, and it's functional, it's useful. But if you want something that's going to endure out of the same material, if you want something that's going to last, something that can handle an earthquake, something that can handle great, great, great stress, you put it through another process. You combine it with oxygen and carbon and you end up with steel. And that's the idea here. That trials and troubles exercise faith, and they do that by a resistance. And by that resistance, by that exercise, by that trial, that trouble, faith grows down into the dirt. It grows up toward God, as it were. It becomes stronger. Our relationship with Christ becomes stronger. Talk about that, becoming more and more united with Christ. You say, well, how can that be? Am I not already united with Christ? And that belies the fact that we don't understand the way faith really works. This bond that unites us to Christ needs to be tested. It's tried. And as it's tested and tried, true and living faith by that means becomes stronger and stronger and stronger. So we cling harder and more to him than ever before. That's why the apostle says now when trials come, You count them all joy. And when we can't, it's really because we don't think much of faith. Faith is just this thing, we have it, good enough. Now, there's more, count it all joy, because not only is faith being tried, but there's a great virtue that grows when faith is tried, which is patience. So he goes on to say, but let patience have her perfect work. What's the idea? As brief as I can. In many ways, you can look at various virtues and qualities of the Christian, like patience, as aspects of faith. They're qualities of faith. Just like when I talked about steel or iron. You can test them for qualities. You can measure them. Hardness, strength, endurance, resistance, tension, ability to hold tension. You do the same thing with faith. And patience is a quality of faith. Now, patience is the ability to endure under stress. That's what patience is. Just like you can take a piece of steel and you can test its ability to resist tension. Pressure. That's patience. That's essentially what it is. You see how this all works then? It's similar to the ability of a marathon runner to run. We all can run to a certain extent, but some farther than others. And we look at the quality of someone who can run a marathon and we say, what do they have? They have endurance. They have ability to take these muscles and this frame and this body and just run. And their lungs don't collapse, they don't fall to the ground. And we all know it has to do with exercise and training and all that. And that's the idea here. that the one great quality of faith that's developed through trial is patience, which is the ability to endure. So recognize that patience isn't what we often think it is either. Often we associate patience with either Stoicism or Fatalism, which again are worldly ideas. What are those? Well, Stoicism goes back to the Greeks, the Stoics they were called, that patience really is the ability to endure pain without showing any emotion, without complaining about it. That's really what it is. Grit your teeth and bear it is one of the most stoical proverbs there are. The stoic is one that you can inflict pain on and you won't show emotion. It's not that. It's not fatalism either. What's fatalism? Fatalism is the attitude that since this trial, since this trouble, since this affliction is inevitable, there's no use reacting at all. There's no use to have any kind of response. Nothing really matters. Can't change it anyway. That's not patience. Patience is a spiritual quality of faith. It is the ability to respond to that trial in a godly manner. That is, in a manner that's not rebellious, that's not bitter, that's not angry. To endure it for God's sake because it's the right thing to do. It is the ability to persevere to the end regardless of the nature of the trial. In many way, patience and perseverance, they're twin sisters. You can't separate them. You can't have perseverance without patience. And it's necessary. That's another thing. Just like we don't think faith needs to be exercised, we don't think we really need patience. But without patience, that is without the ability to persevere, we fall by the spiritual wayside. We die, we collapse. Like the marathon runner who can't make it to the end, he collapses, he's done. We die spiritually. God knows these things. We simply say, well, we endure to the end. God is faithful, that's true. But how do you endure to the end? How do you make it to the end of the marathon? How do you keep going into these things? And God works things. He gives faith, but then he works that faith. He exercises that faith. He tests that faith. And he makes it stronger and stronger and stronger so that it perseveres. And just realize, this doesn't just happen. God uses means. One of the means He uses is trials. That's why we're to count them all joy. Now, lastly, so we talked about the attitude, how we're supposed to have a certain attitude with regard to things that cause us pain and sorrow. And then we talked about what's behind the attitude, something we know. We begin by faith, we reckon things, we consider things, and we consider what God's really doing. The most important thing we're to consider, beside all the other things we might be able to point to, is that our faith is being exercised. And by the exercise of that faith, it's becoming tough, strong, able to endure, which is patience. But now notice there's one more thing, and the apostle's really talking about a goal here. It's not endurance as such, but notice, let patience have her perfect work. There's a goal, there's an end, there's something that faith and patience are working for, and it's this, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Now I have to admit, I struggled mightily to try to make this as plain as I possibly can. So let me try this. Notice, first of all, he talks about a desire, wanting nothing. Now what the apostle is doing by saying that, he's just not teaching us the truth here, but he's saying this whole process involves our desires. We have a will. And faith functions according to that will. Just read the Canons. Read about regeneration, Canons, Head 3-4, and how God affects our will. So we have this will. God doesn't get rid of our will. He doesn't throw away our will. But he makes our will submissive to his. So this is something that involves the will. Remember that. We learn here from James. Faith is something that involves attitude, heart. Faith involves the mind, gotta reckon something. But faith also involves the will. There's something going on with the will here. And notice too, he's saying this is what faith desires. Faith desires something, faith wants something. And now what's interesting here is if we think about what we desire by faith, it probably doesn't line up here. And it's probably due to our own misunderstanding and weakness here. We say to ourselves things like, well, we want to go to heaven. We want to live God eternally. We desire to have this or have that blessing, and this is what we want. Much of that actually belies the fact that we're not perfect Christians. When he talks about being perfect and entire, what's he talking about? What he's talking about is a completed Christian, a mature Christian, may be a better way to think about it. In the same way that we talk about children. We say they're children, they're fully children, they're a human being, they're all there, but we all know they gotta grow. They gotta become adults. And when they become adults, we say, they're there, they've arrived. That's the idea of perfect and entire here. Now we have a lot of ideas about what's a perfect Christian, what's an entire Christian, what's a good Christian, right? We have all kinds of these ideas, about ourself and about others. And we use all kinds of standards. And some of them aren't so bad, but we always put it in terms of whether we have faith or not. whether we believe or not, and it's true. No one's saved without faith, and if one has faith, he's saved. The Bible teaches that. But then there's the way of looking at yourself according to God. You have your ideas. You have your ideas about what you ought to be and what you think you should be, but God has a different one. God has in his plan an idea of the complete and perfect you. And I can assure you, by the way, as long as you're sitting here, you're not there. You're not there yet. Something you sometimes have to remind old people who are good and sick of life, rightly so, who want to go home, and they're not there yet. Sometimes you have to remind them you're not there yet because, well, you're not there yet. God has some more work for you. God wants to shape and mold and fashion you just so, and it's not there yet. What's interesting in this passage is that the apostle defines what the perfect and complete Christian really is. He wants nothing. Did you catch that? The perfect work of patience is that it produces someone who's perfect and entire who wants nothing. How much do you want? What do you want? What do you desire? Now, remember, we're talking about the will here. And we have a long list. Even as Christians, we have a long list. I want this, I desire that. It's often why we can't receive trials and tribulations with all joy, because they go against what we want, what we desire. But true and living faith doesn't want a thing. A perfect and complete faith when it's arrived, faith when it's reached its full maturity, which comes through this process, He says, I don't need a thing. I have everything I need. Well, what's that? I have God. I have God. God is everything. And if I have God who's everything, I don't need anything. I don't need any more money. I don't need a longer life. need even to be pain-free or without sorrow. I don't need to live tomorrow. I don't need anything. That's the perfect work of God through trial. And that's a complete Christian. Amen. Our Father which art in heaven, O Lord our God, we thank Thee for Thy word, a word of truth. We pray for grace that we, as Thy children, may count it all joy when we fall, when we find ourselves surrounded by diverse temptations, knowing the great work that is worked. And we pray, Father, that truly we may arrive at a faith that desires nothing. that wants nothing except Thee, our God. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.