We began looking at this passage last week, and James, we saw there, he lays out the strife or the sickness that’s going on there among the people in the church to whom he is writing. There is this strife that results, this result of worldly thinking, of unbiblical, unchristian posture and attitude of heart that’s going on there, causing this fighting, this quarreling, this warring, this strife and conflict, right? Those are the symptoms. as James evaluates them. We don’t have to look very far to see that we too have these problems and proclivities in our lives as well. These problems of worldliness, a worldly heart posture. But we’ve been, we have to remember, plucked from the fire of the world, right? So we’re not to act in this way, as James tells us, right? We are what? New creations in Christ, united to Christ. Our life is not our own. We’ve been bought with a price, the New Testament says, the price of His precious blood. In the life that we live, we live to our glorious Savior, Jesus Christ. And because of that identity, We are free from the bondage of pride and worldliness and therefore we got to live in that way. There is a cure for this sickness. It’s not a mystery. And James tells us here about the worldliness, and sickness, and strife. And he tells us what, you’ll recall from last week, the source of this strife, and then the sinfulness of this strife, and then the solution, most importantly, to this strife or sickness that he’s put his finger on. And he really has put his finger on spiritual problems, you’ll recall. I’m not gonna go over those first couple of verses, but you’ll recall that he is, you know, you could say in brief, what he’s talking about, his evaluation in those first verses. What causes quarrels and fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war with you? You desire and you don’t have, so you murder, you covet, and you cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, why? Because you don’t ask. You ask, you don’t receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions, right? And he puts his finger on these head verses, right, to go into the passage. their spiritual problems, and in brief, their prayerlessness and their selfishness. We could summarize them in that way in brief. We see this encapsulated in the verses that I just read, particularly verse 3. You do not ask rightly, right? You ask to spend it on your passions, right? Prayerlessness and selfishness. And so in James 4, In verse four, James says, in effect, you know what you’ve got, your problem at bottom, what is that problem? You know what you have, it’s adultery, remember, right? He says, you adulterous people, do you not know that friendship, world, is enmity with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. And James tells him this problem, what it is. This problem is spiritual adultery, right? Spiritual adultery. And we saw last week, this was a common theme in the Old Testament for Israel, as they apostatized, they turned away from the Lord, as they committed idolatry and they worshipped in the high places and worshipped the Baals, right? And the prophets came, the prosecuting attorneys of the prophets came and told them, you’re cheating on the Lord, you’re like a harlot. This is adultery. And as the Spirit works through His Word, and it dawns on us, right, as we read this and encounter this text, when it grips us, right, that it’s not just obvious, bad, wicked people out there that this is addressing, that He’s calling a harlot an adulterer, but rather it’s you and it’s me. And we are floored by this, and the breath is driven from us. When this grips us and we’re moved to ask, if this is the case, Pastor James, what’s the remedy? What’s the cure for this problem? And the Word of Christ answers that question and it says, yes, there is a cure to your severe problem, and it’s a severe treatment. We’ve looked at the source and the sinfulness. Now let’s look at the solution to this sickness, as James gives us in this passage. Right, the start of this solution and this cure is what? It’s this, we read in verse five. Or do you suppose it is no purpose that the scripture says he yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us? Right, that’s the ESV, right, the English Standard Version. Other translations, if you have a different translation, it might render that verse differently. And the reason for this, as some of you know, in other languages, particularly the biblical ones for sure, it can be hard and sometimes impossible to determine if a word is the subject or the object of a verb. And so if you have a different translation, the translators have to make a decision there. That’s why. That’s the reason why. But in the end, the funny thing is, As I read lots of commentaries on this passage, and this particular verse, and there’s lots of freaking out by the different commentators, but at the end of the day, whether you take it as the object or the subject of the verb, in the end it’s a non-issue, really. Why is that? Because the solution is the same, regardless of the translation. The solution and remedy that James gives is the same. In that solution and remedy, is the jealous grace of Jesus Christ. The jealous grace of Jesus Christ, as a friend of mine put it. The jealous grace of Jesus Christ. That’s the solution to this problem that James has put his finger on. And you know, we think back to the Old Testament prophet, Hosea. And you will call, the Lord tells Hosea to marry this woman, Gomer, who commits adultery. In fact, that’s her job. And God says, I’m gonna show Israel what it’s like. I’m gonna show them what it is, what they’ve done to me, and what they continue to do to me. You wanna know what you’re like, Israel? You’re like Gomer. You’re like Gomer. And what is it ultimately that saves Hosea’s wife, Gomer? It’s the jealous love of her husband, right? For this woman who really belongs to him. She is his. And I pray, brothers and sisters, as we think about these things and contemplate the reality of this and the weight of this, that your hearts are pierced at the thought of cheating on the Lord, of committing adultery on the Lord, against the Lord. And I pray that as you are pierced to your heart, that you’re also overwhelmed by the grace of Jesus, overwhelmed by his grace, in knowing his jealous love and his commitment to you who belong to this husband, Jesus. and like a severe medical condition, sometimes requires painful treatments. The pain from the recovery Pastor James gives us can be excruciating, can be excruciating. You know, it’s interesting, that very word itself, excruciating, right, comes, it’s related to the word crucifixion, and they both come from the word cross in Latin. So much so was the pain that he endured. In the pain of recovery, It is the most beautiful thing, right, in human terms, when the jealous love of a husband or of a wife leads to this kind of recovery. How much more so spiritually speaking, right? But the process can be painful. But again, this is why James goes on to say, but he gives more grace. He gives more grace. And we think, here I am, and I’m bearing my sinfulness, And I see as I look in the mirror of God’s Word that I too am a spiritual adulterer. Where’s the remedy for my spiritual adultery to be found? I don’t have it in myself. I don’t have the resources for this remedy. I’ve tried to find the solution myself. It’s not there. It’s simply not there. But listen, brothers and sisters, what James is saying. He’s saying they’re not found in ourselves, but they’re found in him, in Jesus Christ. He gives more grace. He gives more grace. And so whether this verse here, whether it’s his jealousy that possesses us and holds on to us, or that he gives us more grace, it comes down to precisely the same thing. And James goes on to say that grace, when it deals with spiritual adultery, has to go deep, deep down, and sometimes that surgery hurts. In verse six, he picks up and says, God opposes the proud, the stubborn pride in my own heart, but he gives grace to the humble. You must submit to God, you must resist the devil, but he will flee from you. You must draw near to God and he’ll draw near to you. You must experience hands being cleansed and your hearts purified. And your mind, he says, you see how duplicitous your minds have been. Torn between the flashy things of this world and devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ. And we’re convicted as we think about this very thing, right? How much time do you spend with your mind focused on your cell phone or your computer screen compared to focused on your Savior or on YouTube or the news or whatever it might be, right? Fill in the blank. We all have a thing. And he says your double-mindedness must be ended and it must be focused wholly on Jesus Christ. In the word there in verse 8, that we have as double-minded is better translated double-hearted, right? Double-hearted or double-souled, really, is what it means. And so we must have, he’s saying, our affections, our allegiances, our minds, our souls, our hearts turned ever towards Christ, right? And this was the reason, by the way, if you’ve the connection has not entered your mind, if you never thought about this, is why the priests, right, when they were consecrated, and blood was placed where, do you recall? It was placed on their ears, or on their head, on their feet, or toes, or on their hands, and fingers, right? And this is what? It’s a representation that they are set apart and holy, consecrated, all of the person, right? All of them, their thinking, their sensing, their actions, their movements, is holy unto the Lord. And we, by the way, you’ll recall, Apostle Peter says, tells us we are a kingdom of priests, right? And so this is to be true of us as well, wholly given over, consecrated, set apart for the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is why the great Shema in Deuteronomy 6, you’ll recall, hear, O Israel, the Lord is your God, the Lord is one. And it goes on and it says in verse 6 of Deuteronomy 6, and these words that I command you today shall be on your heart You should bind them as a sign on your hand, and you should be as frontless between your eyes. Similar thing, it’s encompassing the whole person, your mind, your thinking, internal and external, your hands, the things that you do. To be informed by the Word of God, the commandments is what Deuteronomy is talking about. And so when we follow James’ prescription of doing these things, submitting, resisting, drawing near, cleansing, purifying, This can be a very uncomfortable thing, right? And the more we’re settled into our sin, the more painful it can be. So much so that he goes on and references these things, you can feel wretched and mourn and weep, and your laughter will be turned to mourning, and your joy to gloom. But verse 10, right, awesomely reassures us that those who humble themselves before the Lord in this way he will exalt, right, gloriously they will be exalted. The putting to death of sin, right, the putting to death of sin, the mortification of sin, turning off that fix of sin, right, like an addictive drug, it can throw us into withdrawals. Right, and sometimes, physically speaking, the best remedy for those withdrawal symptoms is the drug again, it’ll end them. But I’m sure most of you have known in some way, in reading or watching something, or maybe knowing somebody personally, the agony that those coming off addictive drugs can go through. And James is saying to us, as our spiritual surgeon, brothers and sisters in church life or in personal lives, if these are the kinds of problems that you have, God may come and dig down deep with a scalpel of his grace into the roots of your soul to cut out that issue, to excise it from your soul, that you will feel the pain of the withdrawal symptoms as he does so, from this addictive sin, this addiction to sin. that’s blinded you to his grace, that’s made you prayerless, that’s made you selfish, that’s made you calloused towards the Lord in his care, in his jealous love for you, his people. And then it’s quite beautiful, as we look how this passage ends in verses 11 and 12. He says, do not speak evil against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law, but a judge. And then verse 12, there is only one lawgiver and judge who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor? Right, and we get the meaning there, correct? One of the most concrete and recognizable ways, symptoms of man’s sin nature is how easily speaking ill of others just flows right out of our mouth. And then judging them self-righteously by the same commandments that we ourselves fail to keep. It’s insanity. And not only is it the height of hypocrisy, who am I to judge anyone else? Because when we do, we put ourselves above God’s law rather than submitting to it. And when we speak evil of our brothers and sisters, we have placed ourselves in a place of authority which belongs to whom? To God alone. We have no right to assume that authority. It’s not ours to have. We set ourselves up as judge. And then in self-righteousness, condemn others. But James tells us that this role belongs to God alone. The law is designed to what? To expose our sins and to reveal to us what God expects from us now that we are followers of Christ. It is rule of life for us. It is his will for us. It’s a restraint of evil. The law was not given, you see, so we can use it to beat others up with, right? It was not given so that we can use it to make self-righteous declarations and judgments about others. We must stop seeking to judge others and instead, what, humble ourselves before the Lord. Earnestly seeking the grace that he is so willing and freely gives in the person of Jesus Christ. And you know, as I prayed and prepared for this passage, and reflected upon it, there was a hymn that kept coming to mind, and it’s a hymn that didn’t make the cut in our new hymnal. But it’s a hymn called, The Marvelous Grace of Our Loving Lord. The Marvelous Grace of Our Loving Lord. And one line says this, Sin and despair, like the sea waves cold, threaten the soul with infinite loss. grace that is greater. He has grace untold, points to the refuge, the mighty cross, right? And then the refrain that kept coming to me, grace, grace, God’s grace, grace that will pardon and cleanse within. Grace, grace, God’s grace, grace that is greater than all of our sin. And that’s pretty much James’ point, right, in verse 6. It fits it perfectly, right? Jesus is full of pardoning grace, greater grace than all of our sins. Is your Jesus’s grace greater than all of your sins? There’s only one way to find out. Only one way to find out. It hurts, but it’s necessary. You need to find out how great your sins are, and then come and find out how much greater his grace is. And how is it that James could be so certain that Jesus has more grace, greater grace, than these people have sins? How does he know? Because he knew that his brother, Jesus, died for these people. He died for his people, that’s how he knew. And that’s how we know, right? That’s how we know. That’s how you can know that he is far more full of grace, greater grace than all of your sin. He died for you. But you know, here’s the thing. We’re never gonna taste that grace, right? We’re never gonna taste the sweetness and joy and refreshing, cleansing reality of that grace and see it in its fullness until we’ve seen how much we need it, right? When you cheapen your sin, you cheapen his grace. And when we don’t feel like it, when we don’t feel like the pursuit of this, right, it’s a symptom of our friendship with the world, right? So let us praise our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, dear Christian. Brothers and sisters, He gives grace. He loves, He gives, He’s a generous God. May we humble ourselves before Him, acknowledging our sins, and run to Him again and again and always, to Jesus. Let us trust in Him and pray for increased trust and increased faith. And He will grow us. That’s His promise, He will grow us. And oh, how different our lives would look if we truly believe this marvelous grace, the greater grace of our Savior. How much different would our lives be? How much different would they look? Our response and our interactions with others, and the peace and joy of our heart if we truly believe this. May we indeed find in our communion with the Lord Jesus Christ all the grace we will ever need. that will bring us all the satisfaction we’ll ever need in our communion with Him. Amen. Let’s pray. Our great Father in heaven, we come again before you. We are humbled as we do so. We thank you for your word and for this wonderful book that speaks of our lives individually and in fellowship with one another as your people. And Lord, we thank you for the King of glory and look forward to the day when he will return to bring us into the new heavens and the new earth. Father, we thank you for his clean hands and his pure heart, his faithfulness and obedience. We put our trust in him, right? We confess again before you, dear Lord. We have nowhere else to turn. We bring before you, Lord, this congregation this morning, giving you thanks and praise for your mercy towards us. We pray especially for those who are undergoing physical trials and ailments. Lord, we pray that you would pray for all of us who suffer. We ask, dear Lord, that you would console our hearts, give us courage and faith to believe that you are the God of the resurrection, you’re the God of the dead as well, and that we will one day be made whole in glory. Lord, help us to affix our eyes on that reality. Lord, and help us to abide our suffering well. And if it’s your will, Lord, we pray, give us relief from these things. Even for all of us, Father, we pray that you would help us to have hearts filled with your love, caring and loving one another. not in a judgmental, prideful way, Lord, but loving one another with the love that we’ve been shown in Christ, and in a way that would be a witness to the dead and dying world outside in such need of the gospel. Use us, Lord, in our lives to witness to your love. Father, we pray for the families of this church as well. We pray, Lord, for the parents represented here that you would bless them in the roles you place them, Lord, and that as that as fathers and mothers, we would extend that love and be tender towards our children, raising them in the fear of admonition of our Lord and the holy faith. Lord, we pray for our children that you would protect them, that you would bless them, that you would draw them to yourself, that one day they would embrace the faith for themselves and name the name of Christ and live their lives for Him and serve Him for all of their days. Lord, we pray as well, Lord, for those whom we love that want nothing to do with you. We pray, Father, that you would use us to be faithful witnesses in their lives. Lord, we pray that you would give us words to say, but Lord, we ask that you would help us as well to live lives that match the profession of our mouths. Lord, we pray that you would Again, if it’s Your will that You would give them faith, that You would give them life, that they would live for You and love Christ. We thank You for the promise to have fed us afresh this day by Your Word and that You will feed us in the supper with Christ, the bread of heaven. May we see that this is our life and our sustenance through all of our lives. We ask all these things in Christ’s name. Amen.