Well, if you would, go ahead and take your copy of God's Word and open to James chapter five. James chapter five, Lord willing, we will, over the next four weeks, finish out the book of James. Finish out the book of James over the next four weeks. Before I pray, I want to, again, just read to you 2 Corinthians chapter eight, Verse nine, to bookend the message today. 2 Corinthians chapter eight, verse nine, for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Oh Heavenly Father, we praise you this morning that we are eternally rich. We are rich beyond measure, rich beyond our wildest imaginations, rich beyond the richest of the rich here on this earth. Lord, may we consider that this morning, may we consider the deceitfulness and the deception that wealth and money and materials bring our way each and every day. As we know, we live, us personally live in the wealthiest nation ever. May we not be deceived. We pray this in Christ's name, amen. 1 Samuel chapter 2 verse 7 says, the Lord makes poor and he makes rich. He brings low and he exalts. He raises up the poor from the dust. He lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor. Job chapter 42 verse 10 says, at the end of the book, We forget this part of it many times. The Lord restored the fortunes of Job when he had prayed for his friends, and the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. What did he have before? Job 1.3 says he possessed 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, 500 donkeys, and very many servants, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the East. Proverbs 3.9 says, honor the Lord with your wealth. Proverbs 10.22 says, the blessing of the Lord makes rich, and he adds no sorrow to it. Philippians 4.12, Paul says, I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. 1 Timothy 6.10, for the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. So why do I begin this way? I begin this with these texts to remind us that in and of itself, wealth and money and material possessions are not evil. The Lord provides these things in his graces. Actually, we even talked about that in the book of James. As James said, every good gift and every perfect gift is truly from above. all those whom God created in this world, whether in the beginning or now, have and had wealth to some degree or another. God is not against riches and wealth per se. In many ways, wealth and possessions are an expression of God's kindness. And it allows us to kind of enjoy the beauties of his creation and also to enjoy the beauty of his creators creating. Because he is the great creator, we're made in his image. A guy by the name of John Murray said about wealth and riches, it is possible for those to love money even if they don't have it. And it is possible to have money and not love it. Well, you have all of those texts and that quote to hold on to, but then at the other end, at the same time, the Lord Jesus himself gives warning. Matthew 19, 24. Again, I tell you, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God. Now, before we get into James 5, 1 to 6 today, I just kind of want to reset here the context of what's taking place in that day. I think it's important, and the weight of the context will be brought forth in the weight of the text. And so remember these Jewish believers just 10 to 15 years or so ago would have experienced or would have known someone to experience the ascension of the Lord Jesus. And so they're living in this state of kind of this full anticipation and reality that he just left but he's coming back. They're living in the last days and they're waiting for his return and they would have been asking some obvious questions. Questions like, when is he gonna come back? And when will we get to experience the new heavens and the new earth? I mean, that would have been very real to them. Again, they're living in the last days and so are we as we'll get into here in a bit. Remember also who these people are. We looked back and the very first message by Pastor Jared of this series, and these people were most likely those from Acts chapter eight. And then if you fast forward to Acts chapter 11, there was a great famine that took place amongst these people. So life would have been difficult, exponentially difficult than any of us in here could probably even imagine. It was a famine. Well, here comes James, the half-brother of Jesus, and he writes this letter. And he writes this letter to these scattered believers who are discouraged, who are, for the most part, very poor, and who need encouraged. And there were times, as you read this book, that there were probably some waverings of their faith in Christ. And as you travel through this letter, wealth and possessions and money seems to be a tendency for them to be tempted by wanting some of it. Now, in our humanness, I think all of us could sit here and kind of understand why, right? You could see them asking questions like, why is it, as we look out, that we're supposedly the blessed people and yet people all around us have lots and lots of tangible blessings? Look at the rich ones, how they live and what they have. Asking the question, is he really going to come back? Is he really going to do what he said he was going to do? And we are gonna be in the new heavens and the new earth. Is all of this worth it? And so James dealt with this very real temptation. I'm gonna walk through these real quick. This real temptation and the pursuit of money, he kept reminding them of and dealing with this throughout the book. James 1.9, let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation and the rich in his humiliation, because like a flower of the grass, he will pass away. Then in 11b, so also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits. Then in chapter two, verse one, he dealt with this whole idea of partiality going on. My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. Verse five, listen, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him? He's reminding them again. But you have dishonored the poor man. Are not the rich the ones who oppress you and the ones who drag you into court? Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called? And then in chapter four, there's this quarreling going on again amongst some sort of possessions. What causes quarrels and fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? Then you go to verse 2b and he says you covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and you quarrel. And he's going to come back to this next week, actually. Two weeks ago, Pastor Bruce dealt with James 4, 13 to 17, with this rebuke against those who were pursuing wealth with little to no regard for God being a part of that. And so here we are this week in James 5, And he'll make what I would argue is his strongest argument in the whole book. He'll kind of drop the hammer on them and bring it up close and personal with them. And he condemns the deception of wealth and the lifestyles of the rich and famous. He very pointedly calls out unrighteous rich people. While at the same time, I would argue he gives a strong warning to those who are also reading this, who are right with the Lord, that this is tempting for them. And he's cautioning them, but he definitely is very pointed toward the deceitfulness of wealth and riches. And as we read this, this is a really kind of powerful, makes you cringe. It's a little gruesome of how serious James is about the deceitfulness of wealth. Look at James 5, one with me. Come now, you rich. Weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have corroded and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you. And the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in the day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you. And so in this text, we're gonna see essentially two points that James makes. He's gonna show us the coming misery of wealth's deception. And then he's gonna give us the evidence that James gives of wealth's deception. And so with me again, look at verse one. Come now, come now. And he points the finger here very clearly. This is not a general calling to all. This is a very specific audience that he's talking to. It's a listen up right now, it's listen you rich people, you unrighteous rich people. It's kind of the idea of when dad or your boss or the principal kind of just reaches the end of his fuse and it kind of ignites and it erupts and he says listen. With great force here, he's very serious. He's not beating around the bush here, he's right to the point. And what happens here is really interesting because he changes his tone and his audience in this portion of the book compared to the whole rest of the book. And just quickly, the rest of the book, the tone, he's working with some things and he's calling them or challenging them on some things, but he has a different tone with it. In chapter one, verse two, he says, count it all joy, my brothers. In chapter one, verse 16 and 19, he calls them his beloved brothers. Chapter two, verse one, four, and 14, he says, my brothers and my beloved brothers. Chapter three, verse one, he says, my brothers, and then chapter four, verse 11, he says, do not speak evil against one another, brothers. He goes on and says, whoever judges, his brother. And then last week, or two weeks ago, chapter four, verse 13, where he uses the come now language, and this week he says, come now, you rich. His tone has changed drastically. And so who are these rich? Well, in those days, there would have been a drastic divide. You know, sometimes we think about the rich and poor in America. It's not in comparison to the rich and the poor then. There was no such thing as a middle class. There was extreme, extreme, extreme riches. And there was immense poverty. This is the same language here in chapter 5 verse 1 that was used in chapter 6 verse 24 of Luke where it says, but woe to you who are rich. James is bringing up this type of people. that would maybe come around, and some of these Jewish believers would show what? Partiality towards them, chapter two, right? Kind of that idea, oh look, there's the wealthy guy coming in, I could maybe get a piece of that. Look at the jewelry she's wearing, look at how beautiful her clothes are, and look how nice she smells, and look what she's, not driving back then, but you get the point? He ends that section in chapter two, verse seven, and says, are they not the ones who blaspheme and call out the name that you were called to? They're the one who blaspheme the name of the Lord. So here, James is clearly talking to the unrighteous, rich, deceitful, oppressive, the ones who are taking advantage of the poor in that society at that time. Now some would have for sure been wolves in sheep's clothing. They would have been amongst in the church. They would have been trying to take advantage of, trying to sell their product, if you want to say, within the church even. This would have been a temptation for these poor, poor Jewish believers. And James points them out and says, come now, weep and howl, for your misery is coming upon you. Come now, you rich, weep and howl. It's a grim, horrid, kind of shocking picture or idea that James is just pressing upon them, these overly rich, pompous, oppressive, arrogant people. And he says, weep and howl. Your miseries are coming. It's not a matter of if they're coming, it's when they're coming. In other words, if they would actually stop and think about the oppression that they're putting on people in that society and those around them, if they would think about the deceitfulness of what they were doing, they would weep, and how? Have you guys ever been a part of, ever seen, probably on a movie, maybe? But maybe in real life, because that makes it reality, right? Where someone is in such excruciating pain, that they're sobbing, just begging to relieve them of some sort of pain. They maybe even go to their knees crying uncontrollably, screaming, please help. I don't think these are even close, but I was thinking about maybe the delivery of a baby for a woman. They just want to relieve. Maybe a kidney stone for a man. I remember my father-in-law and my mother-in-law literally took ammo, I'll say, out of his house when he had a kidney stone. It was not pretty. Maybe, I know Jeff Lorenzo deals with fires and people burning in fires or being in a car wreck, but I don't think any of these actually do justice. I think the word of God is only sufficient here. Look with me at Luke 16, 19, right? The rich man who was clothed in purple fine linen, who feasted. Verse 20, and at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores. He desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table, treated like an animal almost. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried. And in Hades, being in torment, lifted up his eyes, saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. And he called out, Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue. For I am in anguish in this flame. Could you imagine? Just give me, put a drip of water. I just want a droplet. James moves on and communicates what will happen to their riches. He says, weep and howl, the misery is coming upon you. And here's some evidence. Your riches have rotted, verse two. Your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have corroded. And their corrosion will be evidence. against you and will eat your flesh like fire. Riches rotted, garments moth-eaten, gold and silver corroded. Now at this time, the riches most likely being talked about here are these people would have these massive estate farms, right? Huge estates. And they would have an abundance of crops and grain and goods. Or maybe the riches also is just a general idea of riches in general, just all that they had. And the understanding here is that of the decaying or the deteriorating of their riches. It was known that many of the rich would literally hoard their stuff. It was known that they would gather or have others gather and then they would just kind of sit it around, just kind of look at it and be amazed by how glorious their little kingdom was. Well, what would be the purpose of them gathering and hoarding? Well, you know, so they could kind of sit back and kick back and kind of just take it easy in life. Sound familiar? Luke 12, right? Listen to this text and tell me this doesn't speak to us. He said to them, watch out. Be on guard against all kinds of greed. Life does not consist in abundance and possessions. And then he tells him a story, a parable. A rich man had a fertile farm that produced fine crops. He said to himself, what should I do? I don't have room for all my crops. There's an abundance, right? He said, I know. I'll tear down my barns and build bigger barns. Then I'll have room enough to store all my weed and other goods. And I'll sit back. I'll say to myself, my friend, you have enough stored away for years to come. Now take it easy. Eat, drink, and be merry. Who would have known that text would speak to our generation? These guys would have been the ones who would say, I've worked hard on my life. I got it all now. Or in this case, other works hard for me. Now I get to kick back and I get to adventure, take it easy, eat, drink, and be merry. It's amazing in a lot of ways. They were living the American dream before they even knew what the American dream was. He said, your riches have rotted and your garments have moth eaten. So they're riches and now they're clothing. I mean, in those societies and now in a lot of third world countries, clothing would have been a sign of abundance, right? Nice clothing, even just clothing in general. It would have been a sign of extreme wealth. From my understanding, the peasants would have had but a single outfit, one. Just imagine that. Ladies and men. They're rich with their piles and piles of beautiful clothing. They couldn't even, they would clean out their closets and forget that they had stuff like that even, because there's so much of it. And without the proper chemicals back then, moss would literally eat the clothes. Amazed, the Bible speaks of this, Job 13, 28, I waste away like rotting wood, like a moth-eaten coat. Isaiah 51a, for the moth will devour them as it devours clothing. One guy said, the poor have no worry of their garments eaten by moss, for they wear the only clothes they possess. No clothes would have smelt like they had been stored away because they only wore one outfit. While the rich, theirs are just being eaten without them even knowing that they have so much. Gold and silver corroded is the next point in verse three. Now, understanding that gold and silver could not rust and be corroded. It's a figurative kind of statement here. In other words, you gather all this gold and silver, and in the end, when your misery comes upon you, that gold and silver is as good as if it would have rusted and corroded. Jesus says the same thing in Matthew 6.19. Don't lay up for yourselves treasures on earth. Moth and rust destroy. Thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. Remember, those who received this letter, sitting here reading this, James is kind of saying to them, Why would you want this, dear believers? Why do you want this to happen in the end if we live for the deceitfulness of riches, if they come in amongst us in James chapter two and we show partiality to them? Why do we wanna chase after things like that and be deceiving and go after things that in the end are just gonna be gone? Why do possibly some of us maybe want this? Why do some of us live in this maybe daily exhaustion of getting the next almighty dollar? But I don't think it's the dollar in and of itself, right? Because it's just a piece of paper. It's getting the next thing or getting the next and not being content with where the Lord has placed us. It's so easy, isn't it, to get wrapped up in that stuff? In the world we live in, it's so easy to see the advertisements and see the new car and just to want and to want and to want. And he's saying the life they live is complete foolishness. It's utter stupidity of men and women to pursue these things and to go after this merchandise for the sake of their own comforts and the sake of their own pleasures and for the sake of just being satisfied. But guess what? They're not even satisfied. You know, we'll get into it more next week as James says, but brothers, he kind of says, but you listen, I want to remind you And he changes his tone again, but we'll get into that. We all know that in the end, it's going to be gone. We know that, like intellectually, we all know that. We know that Ecclesiastes is true. I would encourage you guys, read the book of Ecclesiastes this week. You wanna talk about vanity, richest guy, right, ever. And he's just telling his sons time and again, look what I chased after, look what I went after, look what I had. It's all vanity, it's all just toiling. And then I give it to the next generation, they waste it anyways. The never-ending pursuit where people wake up, life is a vapor, they're pursuing and now it's over, they're at the end of their life. And they know it's all gonna be gone. You know what, but then we fall into that trap again. And those same people that get to the end of their life, they know it's gonna be gone. They then follow that up with, I just want my kids to have a little bit better life than I did. And what are they saying? What do they mean by that? They're saying, well, I guess they can spend a lifetime of having a little bit more money, having a little bit more stuff, and just kicking back and taking it easy, being comfortable. And James is pleading with him, oh dear believers, don't listen to that. Don't be deceived by the deceitfulness of riches. Don't fall into that trap. Not that wealth in and of itself is bad, but don't fall into the trap of chasing and pursuing and storing and wanting more. And so he transitions here from the misery of the rich to now these evidences of what they're doing. Look at verse three. They were laying up treasure in the last days. You have laid up treasure in the last days. Okay, let's first look at in the last days. So what is in the last days? Well, Hebrews 1, 1 and 2 clarify that a little bit. Long ago, God spoke many times and in many ways to our ancestors through the prophets. And now in these final days, the last days, he has spoken to us through his son. And so these Jewish believers are living in the last days. He's already told them actually in James 4.14 that, and he says to them, time is short and it's precious, we're in the last days. And he says, I don't know what tomorrow's gonna bring. You and I, we're a mist. We appear for a short time, we're a vapor, we're gonna be gone. And Cheryl, my wife was driving yesterday and you could see the corn stalks. And she called me, and she was just driving, and she's like, it's sad. Summer's coming to an end, right? It's coming quickly. Summer's a mist, right? It's a vapor. It's here and gone. And he says to these rich who have spent their lifetime hoarding this wealth, living for themselves, living for their comforts, and they're clueless about how quickly it's coming. I just had lunch with my grandfather a couple days ago. Maybe it was two days ago, three, I don't know. Anyways, I had lunch with him, and he's gonna be, he's 79, and doesn't know the Lord. Gone, right? I joked around with him, said, oh, happy 50th. He said, oh, how I wish. Right? Lifestyles of the rich and famous that many envy and covet because of their life now. And then we take a breath and then it's over. And then they enter into complete misery. Think about how much time we spent with our clocks. We have those watches now that tell you by minute what you're supposed to do, right? Ding, oh, meeting. Ding, gotta go to the bathroom. Ding, right? Just nonstop. You love it and you hate it at the same time, right? We live by those things. We live by our schedule. I would even argue that we've kind of created little idols out of our clocks and out of our schedules. And yet that's the temporal clock, the daily, weekly planning, and we forget about God's final tick. the ways and the pursuits and the silliness of what these people are pursuing. Luke 12, 22, right after he deals with this, he says, that's why I tell you, don't worry about everyday life. Don't worry about enough food. Don't worry about enough clothes. I'll provide that. Don't I provide to the birds? And then he goes on in chapter 12, verse 33, and he says, sell your possessions and give it to those in need. This will store up treasure for you in heaven. And I love this, I wouldn't recommend the New Living Translation for depth study, but in the New Living Translation it says, and the purses of heaven never get old or develop holes. I love that. In heaven, eternal riches don't fall out of the purse. Douglas Moos said, the hoarding of wealth is wrong, not because it demonstrates utterly false priorities, It's doubly sinful because it also deprives others of their life. I love that. As believers, there's a sense where God uses us as life givers. You guys ever thought about that? We're actually used in the eternal redemptive plan of history as kind of life givers to those around us. It's not what we have. It's what we do with what we have. That's not mine, that's Shannon Hurley's. He said that one night, sitting on his back porch. If you go over there to Uganda, he has a pretty nice house and he's got 50 kids in it anyways. But he says, it's not what you have, it's what we do with what we have. Wealth is fleeting and fading. Look next at verse four, they're stealing. As if they don't have enough, look at verse four. The wages of the laborers who mowed your fields. They worked for them, you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you. And those cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of Hosts. So these rich own these massive properties, these huge estates. And so they have these biggest estates, have enough money, now we gotta hire workers. These workers go out and they work their land, they gather food, till the ground, and they sweat all day. Then that stuff's taken back and they hoard it in their silos, fill up their silos, withhold their money, even the money that's owed to those who worked for them. As if they didn't have enough, they were deceitful for the money that they actually owed to these workers. Wealthy landowners, bank accounts overflowing, not knowing what else to do with it. Don't pay my workers, but I don't know what to do with it. Well, let's build another building. The idea on that day, these guys would have been called day laborers, okay? So every day they would show up, and this still goes on in many third world countries. They show up every day. Well, we need X, Y, and Z then. One, two, three, four. You're gonna work for me. And what would happen is they would agree on a wage. for that day. They were totally dependent on getting that day's wages. Why? Because they had to go home and feed their families. Every day they were dependent on getting what they got from these wealthy landowners. They didn't have credit cards back then, right? These Jewish believers, and even those who were not believers, the unrighteous, knew their Old Testament texts well. Here's what it said in Deuteronomy 24. Never take advantage of poor and destitute laborers, whether they are fellow Israelites or foreigners, whether they're your peoples or not, living in your towns. You pay them their wages each day before sunset, because they are poor and are counting on it. If you don't, they're gonna cry out against the Lord, or against you to the Lord. I just picture these guys, they work every day, they work all day. Sweating, they're dirty, they go, they go to get paid. And they either don't get paid or they withhold a little bit of their money, right? They don't pay them as much as they should have. The anger is they walk away, and they're frustrated. They walk away from this lavish estate that they have. And they walk out the gates, and they're walking home, kind of kicking the dust off their feet. And their families are in need. And you could picture them just crying. And God says, those tears, I can hear them. Those tears that you have because some rich, pompous, foolish man took advantage of you, I hear your tears. He walks past, he looks up at the massive home and walks home and I don't have anything. That's why Jesus adds to the end of this that those tears he hears. And he reminds them and he encourages these believers, because that's part of the purpose of this letter, right? That these unrighteous rich will not get away with this. the deceit, the hiding, the smuggling, the vileness of what they're doing. He says, they will not get away with this. Jeremiah says, woe to him who builds his house unrighteousness and his upper rooms by injustice, who makes his neighbors serve him for nothing. Verse 17, but you have eyes and a heart only for your dishonest gain. You chase after your selfish, heart-driven motives, which is all about you. James 5.5 says, you've lived on the earth in luxury, in self-indulgence. So, they're rich. They're really rich. They then take advantage of the poor. They withhold the money that they're owed for working for them. He says, you've lived on life in luxury. What's he talking about here? They were so blind to what they were doing. They then just had to pamper themselves with their extra money. So as if the money itself wasn't enough, now they have to pamper themselves. We'll get into that term in a second here of what the term luxury actually means, but Ezekiel 1649 says, behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom. She and her daughters had pride. What was that? Excess of food, prosperous ease, did not aid the poor and needy. Prideful arrogance about who they were. Massive amounts of food and easiness of life, yet unwilling to help the poor and needy. What were they doing? They were turning a blind eye to the needy and they were pampering themselves. That's the word here, luxury. It actually has this connotation of softness. and sensitive and pampering yourself. It's this idea of pursuing and living in ways that just make your life cozy. That's what these guys were doing. They were just pursuing things, hoarding things, and whatever they could do to just make their lives as simple and cozy and comfortable and easy as possible. That hits home, right? Think about all the comforts and the ease. Not that in and of itself any of that's wrong, but think about how we pursue those things, we chase them. If we could just get a little bit more comfortable in our life. Once I had this paid off, or once I can just kick back and... Look at verse five again. You fatten your hearts in the day of slaughter. Now, we by no means live in an agrarian society, right? But I think we can all get this. Because we have some people in here who have small farms, have farms, small farms, grew up on farms. We also have a fascination among some of us with chickens, right? So some of us can get this. So some of us put these beautiful, right, these are God's creatures, he's created them. We put these pictures even with a verse, and I love it, by the way, of God's creation. It shows off the glory of God in creation, even his chickens and cows and whatever else we have. It's his beauty. But just think about that, they're kind of just moseying around and they look like they live a nice life. They just eat grass all day or they just run after, now and again they bicker and fight and whatever, I saw that at the Tate's the other week. So they do these things and they're just moseying around without a clue in the world that they're being fattened for slaughter. That's the picture here. They're moseying around, living the good life, and they're being actually plumped up so they can be taken to the butcher shop, slaughtered, and then we purchase them and eat them. They don't know that, though. They don't talk to each other, okay? They don't hang out and say, you know what's coming, Roy. You know, like, here it comes. Brother, sorry, you're getting a little weighty. You might want to back off. Like, eat your veggies, right? But you know what, sad to say, the rich do the same thing. That's what James is painting a picture of here. You're preparing your own misery. You're getting ready to be slaughtered and in misery, and if you would actually just step back and think about it, you would weep and howl. And then in verse six, you've condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you. This term murder here was judicial, so it's denoting that these wealthy people, all that they had, all that they were doing, then they would take advantage of the court systems. And they would use the court systems to take advantage of these poor people. Paying off the courts, slipping money to the judges, subverting justice, This is what he brought up in chapter two. Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court? He said in chapter two. They're the ones who drag you into court. They're taking advantage of you. Why are you showing partiality to them? Why do you wanna be like this? Listen, taking advantage of anyone for your selfish desires is heinous evil. Taking advantage of anyone for whatever reason is heinous evil. From God's perspective, taking advantage of the poor is so ugly. Amos 2.6 says, thus said the Lord, for three transgressions of Israel and for four, I will not revoke punishment because they sell the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals. They trample on the head of the poor. Chapter five, verse 12, for I know how many are your transgressions, your sins, how great they are. You who afflict the righteous, you take a bribe and turn aside the needy at the gate. Rich taking advantage of the poor in this life. And I love that he tags on in this life because the almighty judge hears the cries. This world is ugly, guys. We don't even see how ugly it is, how much people are being taken advantage of, old and young, all different colors. Injustice is taking place all over the place. And he says, listen, in spite of you Jewish believers feeling hopeless here, in spite of you feeling helpless, in spite of you looking at others and seeing, well, they're blessed. God gets the last word. God gets the last word. Money and possessions and materials are actually brought to court by the unrighteous rich. Just think about this. They're brought to court by the unrighteous rich, to the eternal court, not for the sake of them getting out of their crime, it's actually to pull evidence in and reveal how ugly their life was. So they're bringing all those things that they actually stored up, they're bringing them with them, here's the evidence that they created, and then flesh like fire. All injustices and deceitfulness of rich and the poor being taken advantage of will be made right. And listen, outside of Christ, every single one of our hearts in here would be bent in this direction. Because you give an unrighteous, unredeemed man a little bit of power and a little bit of money and they run with it. And we all know that. You give an unrighteous man or woman a little bit of money, a little bit of wealth, a little bit of power, and they run with it. Outside of Christ, we would all be there. That's why we need 1 Corinthians 8 and 9, or 2 Corinthians 8, right? For though, you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that we might become rich. All's I appeal to all of us this morning is consider the gifts given us. Consider the eternal gifts given to us and consider the temporal gifts given to us, the temporal riches that we all have sitting in this room, and may we live open-handed and open-hearted lives towards those who don't have eternal security, but also towards those who don't have financial security. May we live with hearts with compassion. May we do the right thing. When you know that it's the right thing to do, do what's right. That's what James said a couple weeks ago in James 4, verse 17. If you know the right thing to do and you don't do it, you're sinning. We know the right thing to do. Next week, James will come back to the believers and say, with all that said, be patient. And he's gonna bring up the life of Job. We may have little, this is what he's saying to these believers, But in the end, just like Job, we have it all and more. Let's pray.