The Book of James – Part 8:
True Wisdom
Pastor Bruce A. Shields
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SERMON INTRODUCTION
There are only kinds of wisdom in this
world...man’s wisdom and God’s wisdom.
Many times people claim to be living for God,
they claim they love God and are living a pleasing life for Him, while actually
living in their wisdom, and the only person they are trying to please in life
is himself or herself.
A few weeks ago, I spoke about
motivations...and how the scripture tells us that God HAS to be our motivation
in our faith and works, or our “deeds” are worthless and our faith is dad. If your motivation is not God, then it is
self.
The same rule applies to wisdom. If our wisdom is not God’s, then it is mans,
and absolutely worthless.
Today’s scripture asks you to place
yourself under the microscope, and see whether the wisdom you live your life
by, and base your decisions on is Godly, or worldly.
Which wisdom do you live by?
LAST WEEKS SERMON
Part 1 - Faith and Wisdom
Part 2 - Poverty and Riches
Part 3 - Endurance
Part 4 - Christian Living
Part 5 - Brotherly Love
Part 6 - Faith and Works
Part 7 - Taming of the Shrewd
TODAY’S SERMON
Part 8 - True Wisdom
SCRIPTURE READING
James 3:13-18 Two Kinds of Wisdom
13 Who is wise and understanding
among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility
that comes from wisdom. 14 But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish
ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. 15
Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.
16 For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you
find disorder and every evil practice.
17
But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving,
considerate, submissive, full of mercy
and good fruit, impartial and sincere. 18
Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness.
I.
WHO IS WISE AND
UNDERSTANDING?
a. Two Wisdoms
i.
James exposes that there are two wisdoms in operation
ii.
One is God’s wisdom, the other man’s wisdom.
1. Jesus says you
cannot serve both. To follow one, you
must turn from the other.
2. Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate
the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the
other. You cannot serve both God and money.”
3. Ask yourself right
now, do you base your decisions in life on what God wants, or what YOU
want?
a. Is it money over
morality?
b. Or as God wants it,
morality over money?
c. How do you make
your choices in life?
4. “16 Just then a man came up to Jesus and
asked, “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?” - Matthew
19:15-17
a. “I have kept all
the commandments, what do I still lack?”
i.
He recognized that although he lived what he considered
to be a good life, keeping the commandments the best he knew how, he did not
yet have eternal life.
b. What did Jesus tell
the rich young man?
i.
“If you want to be
perfect
(rightly handling the Word of God), go,
sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in
heaven. Then come, follow me.”
ii.
Remember the sermon last week about being perfect in
the eyes of God??
1.
James tells us in
verse 2, “If any man offend NOT in the
word, he is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body.”
2.
Perfection
in God’s eyes is rightly handling the Word of God.
iii.
Jesus tells the rich young man here, the reason he has
not yet gained eternal life was that he was NOT rightly handling the Word of
God.
1. It was obvious to
Jesus that in this rich young man’s life, he was choosing the love of MONEY
over rightly handling the Word of God. (Like prosperity preachers USING God’s
Holy Word to milk those seeking God)
a. They love to quote
“Don’t rob God of tithes and offerings” while forgetting “Do not be lovers of
money”, “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows'
houses, and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the
greater damnation. - Matthew 23:14”
2. So Jesus challenged
the rich man’s morality, telling him to RIGHTLY handle the Word of God, and
choose MORALITY over his money, by selling his possessions and give to the
poor...ONLY THEN could he follow Jesus.
3. To this...the
scripture says, “When the young man heard
this, he went away sad, because he
had great wealth.”
4. He chose his money
over morality...and because of this, he did not rightly understand, nor live
God’s Word, and could NOT follow Jesus or obtain eternal life. His riches remained on earth, and he had no
home or place in heaven because of following his earthly wisdom.
b. Proof of Godly Wisdom
i.
How do you know which wisdom you are living by?
ii.
The scriptures say you can tell by this;
1. Are you choosing
money over morality?
2. or is your life a
reflection of what God’s Word teaches?
3. Are your deeds done
in humility?
4. or are they for
selfish motivation such as, praise, accolades, attention, pride, so YOU feel
good?
iii.
If you live by God’s Wisdom, you will put OTHERS before
yourself, as Jesus said, and your deeds will be done with the right motivation,
to please God and for no other reason.
II.
EVIDENCE OF WORLDLY
WISDOM
a. We can read in the scriptures here about how to
recognize worldly wisdom as well.
1. If you harbor
bitter envy (jealousy, greed, desire, resentment)
2. Selfish ambition
(motivation) for your deeds
3. boasting (bragging,
proud, conceited, full of yourself, vain, self-important, self-centered)
b. THIS WISDOM IS NOT FROM HEAVEN
1. but is EARTHLY,
UNSPIRITUAL and DEMONIC!
2. Where you have
these things (earthly wisdom), you will find disorder, and every evil practice.
c. Time to Change Your Focus!
i.
Do not be like the
rich young man who gave up his eternal home because he chose money over
morality!
1. It is time to take
your attention and focus off yourself and put it on Jesus!
2. Essentially,
selfish people are worshipping themselves!
3. You become your own false idol, making yourself your
god when you put yourself before God and His wisdom!
III.
WISDOM THAT DOES
COME FROM HEAVEN
a. To ask the question of wisdom, you in turn must examine
the way you live, and the decisions you make
i.
Wisdom that does come down from heaven is;
1. pure - clean and
wholesome
2. peace-loving - (long
for, love, desire, seek PEACE) not aggressive or troublemaking
3. considerate -
putting others before yourself (true biblical love)
4. submissive - to God
and others as instructed in the Word of God - “Submit to one another out of
reverence for the Lord”
5. full of mercy - So
you may receive mercy
6. good fruit -
motivated by pleasing and serving God, not for recognition, praise, accolades,
back-pats, high-fives, attention, etc...
7. impartial -
treating all others the same, not based on their income, name, possessions,
where they come from, etc...
8. sincere - If it is
not from the heart, it is not real...and it too is worthless! Sincere is truth and honesty in love.
a.
Some
do not like coming to me because they know, though in love, they will get the
truth, and not everyone wants to hear the truth.
b.
In
fact, we have on more than one occasion people leave the church because they
received the truth in love rather than what they wanted to hear.
c.
You
have to ask yourself, if God does, is, or works in your ways is He even God?
d.
Some
don’t want God, they want an all-powerful Genie to do their bidding in the form
of a prayer.
ii.
When instructed by God, Able obeyed and Cain “did
things his way” and expect God to bless it.
1. When Cain was
corrected by God for his disobedience, he became angry.
2. He was jealous of
Abel’s relationship with God (which he too could obtain through obedience), but
refused to submit to God
3. Cain’s jealousy
caused him to blame (it is always someone else’s fault when we sin...right?)
4. His anger,
jealousy, blame, this sin when un-confessed, and he did not repent, and it grew
into another sin, murder of his brother.
5. All because he
chose earthly wisdom over godly instruction.
b. Another sign of
heavenly wisdom is you are Peacemakers who sow
in peace reap a harvest of
RIGHTEOUSNESS.
CONCLUSION
Are you making decisions in this life based
on worldly wisdom like the rich man who refused to listen to Jesus? or are you living a life of decisions based
on rightly handling the Word of God?
The rich young man sacrificed God’s wisdom,
and turned away from Jesus’ instruction, and lost his eternal life for the love
of his money.
God calls us to live in His wisdom, His
instruction above all other.
Choose morality over money...chose God
above all else.
Doing this, Jesus says you will gain the
eternal life you seek. And as we read in
James today, you will reap a harvest of RIGHTEOUSNESS, which is required for
your salvation.
Want to learn more about
Salvation and Getting Saved?
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