I invite you to turn in your Bibles to Isaiah chapter 65. We'll do our scripture reading and then have our prayer of illumination. So Isaiah 65, verses 17 through 25. I believe you'll find that on page 624 in your Pew Bible. Hear the word of our God. For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind. But be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create. For behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy and her people to be a gladness. I will rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people. No more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress. No more shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days or an old man who does not fill out his days. For the young man shall die 100 years old, and the sinner 100 years old shall be accursed. They shall build houses and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit. They shall not plant and another eat. For like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be. And my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity. For they shall be the offspring of the blessed of the Lord and their descendants with them. Before they call, I will answer. Where they are yet speaking, I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall graze together. The lion shall eat straw like the ox. And dust shall be the serpent's food. And they shall not hurt or destroy. In all my holy mountain, says the Lord. I invite you to turn over to the New Testament. The book of James, chapter 1. This will be our text for this morning's message. I believe you'll find this on page 1,011 in your Pew Bible. James, chapter 1. My sermon text will be verses 13 through 18, but I'm going to begin reading at the beginning of the chapter and read all the way down through verse 18 so that we can get the context here. So again, this is the word of our God. James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the 12 tribes in the dispersion, greetings. Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord. He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. 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. For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass. Its flowers fall. and its beauty perishes, so also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits. Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial. For when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life which God has promised to those who love him. Let no one say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God. For God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. And then desire, when it has conceived, gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. Of his own will, he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures. Let's go. to the Lord in prayer and ask his blessing on the preaching of his word. Our Father, we thank you again that you have given us the opportunity this morning to gather as your people and to worship your great name. Lord, we readily acknowledge that none of us would be here if it wasn't for your work of grace in us, that we would not be gathering to worship you if you had not first called us out of our sin and brought us to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Once we were not your people, but now we are your people. Once we had not received mercy, but now we have received mercy. Lord, our prayer is that as we gather now as your people, that you would speak to us through your word, that you would so impress upon our hearts and minds your truth, that we cannot but be changed by it. We pray all of this in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, I'm sure that you are familiar with the connection between trials and temptation. What I mean by that is I'm sure that you know from experience the way in which during trials, especially unexpected trials or hardships that you might experience, that you not only experience the trial, but that you also often experience increased temptation in the midst of those trials to do or to think things that you know are contrary to the will and the word of God. We could put it this way, that during increased times of stress and difficulty and sorrow in our life, we often feel as if sin is crouching at our door. It's important that we be careful how we speak about this connection between trials and temptation. Trials themselves are not the cause of our temptations. It's not as if trials make us sin or that they automatically bring temptation. And yet it is true that trials provide the opportunity for temptation and sin. We often respond poorly to our trials. We often turn to sinful ways to try to cope with our difficulties. In fact, sadly, we often end up having to learn not only from our trials, but from our own moral failures during those trials. Of course, there's plenty of examples of this in the Bible. We could think of Abraham in Genesis chapter 12, you may remember, after God makes these amazing promises to Abraham that he will bless him and make a great nation of him. Abraham experiences this trial of a severe famine that comes on the land where he's living, and he has to flee to Egypt to avoid this famine. And what does Abraham do? He might think that he would be trusting the Lord. He would believe that God was going to take care of him because God had just made these promises to him. But Abraham resorts to his own means. He decides to be less than honest. He tells his wife Sarai that she should lie and say that she's his sister instead of his wife. Or we can think of Peter in the New Testament when Peter has to face the trial of Jesus' arrest. And along with this, the fear that he, too, might be arrested and killed for knowing Jesus. What does Peter do? Peter also lies. In fact, Peter denies three times that he was ever even with Jesus. You see, brothers and sisters, while trials can certainly help us to grow stronger, They also bring the opportunity for sin and responses that really are a rejection of God's ways. Think about it for a minute. When someone you love dies, when you become sick, when someone treats you badly, when you lose your job, or when you're physically injured, or someone you've known for a long time turns against you, or maybe if somebody mocks you or looks down upon you because you're a Christian, It's easy when these sort of things happen for us to respond in ways that are really contrary to the will and the word of God. Think about it. We can respond to our trials by becoming angry. We can respond to our trials by treating others badly. We can respond to our trials by hating others in our hearts or coveting what others have. We can respond to our trials by turning to sinful and destructive pleasures. We can respond to our trials by withdrawing from the body of Christ. We can respond to our trials by resorting to underhanded and dishonest ways to get ahead. We can respond to our trials by becoming self-absorbed and wallowing in self-pity. Or maybe fundamental to all of these, we can respond to our trials by doubting the goodness and love of God. Of course, all of this is sin. All of this is really a rejection of God's ways and of God's truth and of God's rule over us. It's actually this connection, the connection between trials and temptation that James is actually addressing in these verses in James chapter 1, verses 13 through 18. And the problem is this isn't immediately obvious, necessarily, when you look at this passage, that James is really connecting trials with temptation. in our English translations that James is really changing the subject when he gets to verse 13. Many people interpret the book of James this way. They think that James is kind of abruptly just changing subjects over and over again. James begins here in James chapter 1 by talking about trials, and then all of a sudden he's talking about wisdom, and then he's talking about poverty and riches, and then when he gets to verse 13, now he's changed the subject again, and all of a sudden he's talking about temptation. Brothers and sisters, this isn't really the case. There's actually a theme that runs through this entire section here of James chapter 1 from verse 2 all the way to verse 18. It's the theme of testing and trials. And when James gets here to verse 13, he's still thinking about this theme, the theme of trials and testing. And as I said, our English translations don't make this exactly clear. But the Greek of this text really shows this to be true. You see, there's something that you need to understand here about this text. word, a word in the Greek language that can actually have two meanings. It can mean both, to be tested, but it can also mean to be tempted. You see, in English, we have two words. If we want to talk about being tested, we use one English word, and if we want to talk about being tempted, we use another word for that. But it's different. In the Greek language, there's one word that can mean to make trial of something, to test, or also to tempt. And it's this word that appears three times here. And interestingly, this word comes from the same root as the word that James uses earlier for trials, the word he uses in verse 2 and in verse 12. What this shows is that James is really connecting what he said earlier about trials with what he begins to say here in verse 13. And yet it's also clear that James is making some sort of transition. He's moving from talking about testing in general to talking about the sort of temptation that we might experience during testing. This is clear because by the time he gets to verse 14 and 15, it's clear that he's talking about sin. And this is why in most of our English translations, our English Bibles, they will translate verse 13 using the English word tempted throughout the verse. But remember what I said, this Greek word can mean tempted. It can also mean tested. And I agree with those who think that at the beginning of verse 13 here, James is making a play on words. He's using this one Greek word in two different senses, both in the sense of being tested and in the sense of being tempted, so that really we should translate this verse this way. We should translate it to say, let no one say when being tested that I am being tempted by God. You see, that translation makes clear the connection that James is making between testing and temptation. It also brings to light, I think, James's particular concern here, the concern that he raises in these verses. There's really two parts to this text. If we were going to break it down, there's really two sections. The first section has to do with a concern, an issue that James raises here. We see this at the beginning of verse 13. And then the rest of the verses are really James' response to this concern. And this is what I want to do, is to break down my message the same way. I want to begin by having us think about the concern that James raises here at the beginning of verse 13, and then to think about how James responds to this in the rest of these verses. So what is James so concerned about? What does he want us to do? Or maybe the better question is, what does he want us not to do? As I said already, James is aware of the connection between trials and temptation, that when we're experiencing trials and hardships in our life, we're very prone to temptation and to sin. And it's because of this connection that James is concerned that we might be led astray. The language he actually uses here in verse 16 is that we might be deceived He's afraid that we might be deceived into thinking that God is the one who's actually tempting us to sin. You see, he's afraid we might fall into thinking that God has actually turned against us, and that in the end, we might end up blaming God for our sin. Listen again to my translation of the beginning of verse 13. Let no one say, when being tested, that I am being tempted by God. You see, James doesn't want us to think that God is the one tempting us. He doesn't want us to blame God for our sin. Now, you might be thinking, you might be sitting here this morning and you're thinking, well, I would never actually fall into this sort of thing. I would never fall into thinking that God was tempting me or to blame God for my sin. You see, it's sort of easy to disregard the concern that James raises here. You know what we do when we come to church, when we're listening to the preaching of God's Word, what I'm doing right now? We often sit there and we think, well, this is a message that would be great for that person over there. We think of Mrs. So-and-so or Mr. So-and-so. They really need to hear what the preacher is saying. I hope they're listening. My children, I really hope they're listening because they need to hear this message. My spouse, I hope he or she is listening because they really need to hear this. We're all guilty of this, I think. I'm certainly guilty of this. We think the message applies to everyone else but us. Brothers and sisters, I think this is a message for all of us. I think we need to hear this concern that James raises. I think we're more prone to this than we might at first realize. Think about it for a minute. When you're going through some sort of trial, something that's painful, that brings sorrow and frustration in your life. And then on top of this, in the midst of that trial, you find yourself responding poorly. You find yourself experiencing new temptations. And you find yourself even falling into sin, so that you're not only just experiencing the weight of that trial and all that that brings into your life, but on top of this, you are feeling the shame of your sin and the discouragement of the choices that you've made. You wish you were stronger and that you had responded differently to your trial. I think for a minute in the midst of this, isn't it easy to feel as if God is against you? Maybe even that God is ordaining things to make you fail. Isn't it easy to feel that rather than helping you to overcome sin and to resist temptation, that God seems to be working your circumstances to actually lead you into temptation? Don't we have the tendency to think sometimes If this didn't happen, if that thing just didn't happen in my life, then I wouldn't be responding this way. And when we think that, aren't we really blaming God for our sin? You see, I think we're actually more prone to this than we might think. I think there's actually three things that really underlie James's concern here. The first is the argument that he makes about trials earlier here in this chapter, especially in verses 2 through 4. James has been arguing up to this point that trials are really normal for us as Christians. We tend to think of them as sort of painful experiences that have no purpose, but James says something very different. They're necessary. In fact, they're the necessary means that God uses to strengthen our faith. You see, God not only allows, he even ordains trials to come into your life for the purpose of refining you. That's what the language of testing really means that James uses here. It's a refining, a purifying testing. The purpose is that God would make you steadfast in faith. And what James says is that you need this steadfastness if you're going to grow mature and actually endure until the end. Brothers and sisters, if this is true, if God is sovereignly bringing trials into your life for this purpose, And if you find that in the midst of these trials that you're struggling with temptation, then it's easy for us to think that God maybe is sovereignly bringing these temptations, that part of his testing is actually bringing temptations into my life. You see, I think the concern James has is that we might use the sovereignty of God as an excuse for our sin. It's actually not hard to do. It's easy to fall into this. If God controls all things, even the trials that come into my life, if he's working out his perfect plan, not only for all of creation, but for each of our lives, then we could reason that God is the one making me sin. There's really nothing that I can do about it. The second thing I think that really underlies Jane's concern here is our tendency to doubt the goodness of God, especially in our trials. You see, when we go through trials, the question that rises in our minds is, is God really for us? It's sad, but I think it's true that it doesn't matter how much God has done for us in the past. We are such fickle and unstable creatures that when new trials and difficulties arise in our lives, we are very easily tempted to doubt the goodness of God. You see, there's a fundamental question, a question that should be settled for every Christian. It's this question, is God for us or is God against us? Brothers and sisters, in Christ, the answer to that question is that God is for us. Christ has removed the enmity that existed between us and God. He has taken away our sin. He bore the wrath of God for us so that we are reconciled to God. And now God is for us. We have become the objects. of God's eternal grace and favor. And yet it's amazing how this question can still raise its ugly head in our lives. Is God really for us? And I think there's two things more than anything else that you will experience that make us doubt God's goodness. The first one is trials. The second is our struggles with temptation and sin. Think about it. Both of these seem in some way to be a denial of the victory of Christ. You might ask yourself, if you've truly been transferred from the dominion of darkness into the kingdom of God's Son, if you've truly been delivered from this present evil age, if you're truly a child of God, why is it that you continue to suffer? We might also ask sometimes, why, if we're no longer a slave to sin, as the Bible says, if we've really been set free in Christ, why do we still struggle with sin and temptation? You see, these things, trials, and especially the temptations we experience in trials, make us doubt that God is really for us. And when we doubt God's goodness, it's so easy to just take that one little baby step further and begin to blame him for our struggles and for our sin. And I think there's one final thing that really underlies the concern James has here. It's our tendency to blame others for our sin, to look for the cause of our temptation outside of ourselves. Think about it for a minute. When we get angry at someone, what do we tend to do? We tend to justify our action by saying that it was what they did that demanded such a response. Did you hear what they said? Did you see what they did? You see, we end up blaming them for our sin. We like to point the finger everywhere but toward us. You see, it's because of our children. It's because of what our spouse did. It's because of that coworker we have. It's because of the advertisers. These are the things that are making me sin. Brothers and sisters, when you point the finger everywhere else but toward yourself, it is inevitable that you will also end up pointing it at God himself. This is exactly what Adam did in the garden. You may remember. When God came to confront him over his sin, what did he say? He blamed his wife. He said, this is the woman, but then he added this, whom you gave to me. You see, he was really blaming God. And this is true of us as well. When you blame your circumstances, when you blame your spouse, and when you blame your children, and when you blame others, you're really blaming God because he brought all of these things into your life. He's the one that has ordained all things. So how does James respond to all of this? What does James have to teach us? Well, James tells us that this way of thinking, this blaming God, is dangerous and wrong for three reasons. First of all, it's wrong because it's a misunderstanding of God's relationship toward evil. Listen again to what James says in verse 13. He says, let no one say. When he is tested, I am being tempted by God. And then he adds this, for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. See, what James is saying here is that our blaming God or in any way associating our sin with God distorts the very character of God. There's really two interrelated ideas that James presents here. First, James defends the goodness. and the purity and the perfection of God. What he literally says here is that God is without temptation. You see, it's impossible for him to desire that which is evil, for evil is contrary to his very nature. It's the very antithesis of his perfections. John brings this out in 1 John 1 in verse 5. He says this, this is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, And in him is no darkness at all. You see, God is as opposed to and incompatible with evil and sin as light is to darkness. And the related idea here is that if God is without evil, if there's no evil desire in him, then it is impossible and inconceivable that he would desire evil in us, that he would entice us to sin. You see, if God was tempting us, if he was testing us by luring us to sin, it would mean that he had some evil intention, that he had some propensity toward evil. Matthew Henry put it this way. He said, God cannot be a promoter of what is repugnant to his nature. You see, God hates evil. He detests it. The very idea that God would tempt us to evil is a denial of everything the Bible reveals about his faithfulness. his goodness, his holiness, his truthfulness. It would be a denial of everything that God has revealed about his holy wrath, about his justice, about his zeal for his own glory. Brothers and sisters, sadly, many deny this teaching about the goodness and the purity and the perfection of God. The argument goes like this. Because evil exists in our world, God must either not be sovereign or he must not be good. but he cannot possibly be both. You see, either we have a God who is good, but he's powerless. He controls nothing. Or we have a God who's sovereign and in control, but he can't possibly be entirely good. He must be evil as well. But brothers and sisters, the Bible never puts these two things in opposition to one another. God's sovereignty or God's goodness, it actually upholds both. is absolutely sovereign. Nothing happens outside of his will. He controls everything that comes to pass, even the evil in our world. And yet God is not the author of sin. He's not tainted by evil. He is glorious in his righteousness, holiness, goodness, and truth. Hermann Bavink said this, God does not will sin. He is far from iniquity. He forbids it and punishes it severely. Yet it exists and is subject to his rule. This is what James is teaching here. God is without temptation. There is no ounce of evil in him. And I think it's important to remember here that the concern James has is not just theoretical. It's practical. It's pastoral. He doesn't want us in our trials and in the temptation we experience in those trials to think that God has turned against us, that he's testing us by tempting us. Brothers and sisters, James wants you to believe that God is good, that he's good even in your trials, that he doesn't lead you to temptation. He only leads you in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Well, this brings me to the second thing that's wrong with our blaming God. James not only says it's a misunderstanding of God's relationship toward evil, It's also a misunderstanding of our relationship toward evil. Let me read again what James writes here in verse 14 and 15. He says this, but each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. And then desire, when it is conceived, gives birth to sin. And sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death. There are three things that James actually teaches here about sin. I'm only going to touch on them briefly. Really, these verses could be a sermon in themselves. But I really wanted us to see the big picture of this entire argument James makes from verse 13 to 18. So I'm only going to be able to touch on these things. But they're important. The first thing James teaches here has to do with the origin of sin. The Bible is clear that sin begins with us. James says here that temptation arises from our own desire. Notice in verse 14, who is the one doing the luring and the enticing? It's not God. It's not other people. It's us. James says that each person here is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. You see, we are the ones that are responsible for our sin. We do it not because God is making us do it. We do it not because our trials are forcing us to it. We do it because we love it. We do it because we desire it. You see, temptation is not really an external problem that comes to us from the outside. It comes to us rather from within. It's an internal problem, a problem of the heart. This is what Jesus teaches in Mark chapter 7. We read this passage as part of our worship this morning. What Jesus says is that what defiles a person is not what comes into them from the outside, but rather it's what comes from within. It's the evil thoughts. It's the evil actions of a corrupt heart. Well, the corruption and depravity of man is undeniably taught in scripture, and our human experience certainly backs this up. Brothers and sisters, this is the doctrine that human beings continually deny. And this is certainly true in our world today. We're living in a world where the goodness of man is assumed. Everyone plays the blame game. There's external reasons for everybody's bad behavior and actions. Think about it. It's because of economic injustice or bad government policies or discrimination or a lack of education. These are the sort of things that cause us to behave the way we do. Of course, we, too, can fall into this sort of blame game. The reasoning goes like this. It's because of the TV. It's because of Hollywood. It's because of the advertisers. It's because of the Internet. It's because of our culture. These things are making me sin. I hope you realize that this simply isn't true. Brothers and sisters, it wouldn't matter if you were on a desert island completely alone with no people and no Internet and no media and no TV. You would invent new ways to sin. because sin flows from the heart. It's part of our corruption, and we are the ones responsible for it. The second thing James teaches here is the danger of sin. You can notice the progression here in verse 15. He says that desire conceives, and then he says that it gives birth to sin, and then sin grows until it's fully grown and brings forth death. I think this is so often shown to be true in our own lives. Our giving in to some thought or some desire leads to actions and choices that we later regret. The point here that James is making is that sin is dangerous. If you give yourself to it, it takes root in you. It enslaves you. Its demands and its consequences are constantly growing. Sin cannot be managed. It cannot be controlled. It must be resisted. and it must be put to death by the power of the Spirit. This is true even in your trials, especially in your trials. And the third thing James teaches here about sin, then, is the end or the outcome of sin. He says in verse 15 that sin brings forth death. You see, sin never brings life. It always destroys. It promises happiness and fulfillment, but it only ever harms you. It destroys your ability to enjoy God's good gifts and to live to His glory because, as James says, it's not the path to life. It is, in fact, the path to death. What James has to say here about the danger and the outcome of sin is why he's so concerned that we not blame God for our sin, that we not be deceived about the true origin of our sin. Because James knows this, that unless we recognize that sin is our problem, Unless we stop blaming others and blaming God, we will never truly understand the character of God and His provision for us in Christ. We'll never really take hold of that provision the way we should and seek His mercy and grace, which can help us in our struggle with sin. Brothers and sisters, this leads me to the last thing here James says is wrong. with our blaming God. It's not just that it's a misunderstanding of God's relationship toward evil, and it's a misunderstanding of our relationship toward evil. But lastly, it's a misunderstanding of God's relationship and attitude toward us in Christ. You see, James spends the rest of these verses, verses 17 and 18, really telling us about the way in which God is for us as his people. To think that God is against us, to think that God is tempting us is really inconceivable when we understand his provision for us in Jesus Christ. I want you to think with me just for a minute about what James has to tell us here in verse 17 about the character of God and especially about his attitude towards us. James says, first of all, that God is the one who gives us good gifts. He says every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. You see, God doesn't give you bad gifts. He only gives you good gifts. He delights to give you good gifts. James here is really echoing the teaching of Jesus in Matthew chapter seven there. Jesus calls God our father and he compares him with earthly fathers who he says are evil. And of course, What is meant there is that God is not evil. God, of course, is good. And what Jesus says here is that God, more than earthly fathers, knows how to give good gifts to his children. In fact, he delights to do this. And I think it's interesting that James here, when he speaks about God giving us good gifts, also refers to God as our father. He refers to him here in verse 17 as the father of lights. That language of lights probably refers to the sun and the moon and the stars. It's saying that he is the father of creation. The idea here is that God, who is your creator, who spoke all things into existence, who maintains and controls the planets and the stars in their orbit, James is saying, this God, this creator, is now in Christ, your father. And I think there is no more comforting image in all of scripture and the image and the title of God as Father. It speaks to the intimacy we enjoy with him. It speaks to the promise of his loving provision. I say this to you who are here this morning. You may have had a bad example for an earthly father. You may have had a father who was not godly or did not treat you well. But I hope that you will not let that taint your view of your heavenly father. You see, we're not actually meant to understand God as our father from the example of our earthly fathers, it's actually supposed to be the other way around. It's what the Bible reveals about the fatherhood of God that actually makes us understand what an earthly father is truly supposed to be like. God is our true father. And to know that God is your father is to know for certain that God is for you, that he will never be against you. And James really brings this home by speaking here about the immutability of God, the fact that God doesn't change. He says he's a father with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. You see, God is not like us. We change our moods like the weather. We often turn on one another. It can even be among people who have known each other for some time, even among spouses who have been married for years. through times where they get upset, where they speak unkindly to one another. But God is not like this. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He never turns against us. And what this means is that his verdict in your case, the fact that in Christ you are forgiven and justified, this cannot and will not change. God is for you in Christ. He will never be against you. There's one final thing that James has to teach us here. He doesn't just tell us about the character of God and his attitude for us. He has to end here in verse 18 by actually telling us what God has done for us in Christ. He says this. And of his own will, he says, he brought us forth by the word of truth. When James says here that God brought us forth, literally it means that he caused us to be born. You see, God chose to bring us from death to life, James is saying, through the message of the gospel. If you're here this morning and you're a Christian, it's because God has done a work of resurrection in you. The Bible refers to this as a new birth. And James says that God did this, that we would be a kind of first fruits of his creatures. This is the last thing he has to say in this section, and it's somewhat hard to understand what he means. What does he mean with us being the firstfruits of his creatures? Well, it helps to understand how the Old Testament uses this language of firstfruits. The firstfruits were the first produce of the harvest that the people of God would gather, and they were to bring this as an offering to the Lord. I think what James is saying here is this, that we, the church, are the firstfruits or the beginning of God's harvest of recreation. You see, we're the beginning of God's promise that he will redeem all of creation, that he will bring about a new heavens and a new earth. And what this means is that you are not only guaranteed in Christ that you will be part of God's new heavens and new earth. It means that you are already a part of the kingdom of God, that we, the people of God, are already experiencing the redemption that all of creation is waiting for. And what James makes clear is that this is all because of God's grace. God did this of his own free will. He chose to make us the first fruits of his kingdom. And how did he do this? He did this by giving the ultimate good and perfect gift, his own son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who came from heaven to bear your sin and to reconcile you to God. What does all this mean, brothers and sisters? It means this. And when you experience trials in your life and when in the midst of that you're struggling with temptation and sin, don't be deceived and think that somehow God has turned against you so that you blame him for your struggles. Know that in Christ, God is for you. He will never entice you to sin. And if we could really sum up everything that James is saying here, if it could really put the point of this whole passage into one sentence, it would be this. James is saying that rather than tempting us to sin, God has done the very opposite. He has done everything necessary to deliver us from sin and to provide for us true and abundant and eternal life. Let us pray. Father, we stand amazed at your grace to us in Christ. Lord, we are the ones responsible for our sin. And not only are we responsible, but we shift our blame. Sadly, we shifted on you. And yet you still chose to call us out of sin to send your son to suffer in our place, that we might be reconciled to you and know you as our father. Lord, help us. to believe that these things are true, even when the circumstances of our life seem to say otherwise. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.