God's Purpose in Your Trials

A couple of announcements. First of all, the crutchfields want to invite all of you over this afternoon to their home and their pool and have a picnic, barbecue, they'll have a barbecue fire, so you have to bring your own offering, your own meat and salad and something to share with others and just come and have a good time of fellowship, Janay said and bring your modest bathing suits. So come over and have a good time. If you don't know how to get there, you can ask Bill or one of the crutchfields and they'll give you directions that's very easy to find out in the country in a wonderful setting you'll enjoy that time. The other thing is, Christian Montoya, as we keep wanting to remind you, has been moved, update you, he's been moved to children's hospital.

I talked to Cassandra yesterday and she's very positive, yesterday afternoon things have improved, got them in another room, they were having some difficulties at first and he's actually showing some improvement, he was moving his legs yesterday a little bit and able to eat, he's got a tracheotomy and yet he's learned to eat already and so keep praying for them, this is going to be a long ordeal and I think God can bring about rapid healing without a doubt, we believe he could touch him and raise him up, just keep praying for them, this is quite a trial they're going through, we're going to talk about trials this morning and there's probably no better example, they can think of presently than what they've been facing over this last month and a half and so keep praying for Cassandra and Ronnie as they go through this and then there's a correction for the bullet and I love to correct Joan, there's a mistake in the bulletin, there's a mistake in the bulletin that Joan does and I want you all to know that.

Camelotus doesn't live out of our place, she lives at 570, Garnett Carrus and her phone number is 516-7872 so you that are want to participate in the moms and kids swim on July 26th, you can give her a call and write a jot down that address and then I just kind of want to keep reminding you of this, if you'd like to participate in one of the house fellowships we need some host homes for the fall, it's basically a six or eight week commitment, he's won't go on forever unless a group just decides they want to go on but if you'd like to host one of these Bible studies not teach it but host it in your home over those six or eight weeks, if you'd contact us it'd be wonderful, we need several homes and we'll schedule the nights that would work out for you, we want to have them on several different nights, Tuesday, Wednesday Thursday especially perhaps even another night of the week, Monday or Friday but if you'd contact us that'd be great, we'd like you to participate in that.

Today we want to begin to look at the book of James, James is a very difficult book, the reason it's difficult is not because it's hard to understand, it's not hard to understand, it's one of the most easily understood books in the New Testament, in fact that's what makes it difficult because we do understand it and from the beginning of the book until the end James is in my face, from start to finish, he looks into my heart, he sees the bottomless pit of evil and he makes it very clear to me about my sins, my pride and prejudice and self-righteousness and hypocrisy and deceit and those kinds of things, he puts his finger on you and so it's a difficult book, it's an easy book to neglect because it speaks so directly through our hearts.

Now there are some difficulties in the book of James as we look at James and we compare what James says about justification and what the Apostle Paul says but they don't contradict, we simply have to understand their context and what they are speaking to. The thing about James is that he targets our cold, deliberate sins of the spirit and he delivers a message to us that we need to hear so desperately and he does it with lethal accuracy, Howard Hendrick says, he doesn't strafe the deck, he drops the bomb right down into the funnel and that's exactly what it feels like when you read this book and the spirit of God begins to speak to your heart from these words that come from the word of God. James is a letter that's written from a pastor to his flock that has been scattered, they've been scattered because James was a pastor in the church in Jerusalem and as persecution rose, if you remember reading through the book of Acts, as persecution began to come especially at first at the hand of Paul, the church scattered and some of them these Jewish believers, these first believers who were Jewish, who were part of a Jewish community who still participated in all of that, began to go out from Jerusalem, they began to face some great difficulties and hard times and persecution primarily from other Jews who were not Christians.

And so the Apostle James is writing to them, this book was probably written in the forties very early in the history of the church and he applies the gospel in some powerful ways. Now the result of them going out like this, this dispersion of these early believers was that they were tempted, they were tempted to allow their circumstances to affect their lives, to shape their lives. It became an excuse for fragmentation that is disconnecting what they believed with how they lived. You've never had that problem, have you? When you disconnect what you believe from what you live, you have orthodoxy but not orthopraxy, that you believe the right thing but you don't do the right thing, you've probably never struggled with that like me.

But these believers did and so James writes to them because he says you can't live like that, you must have integrity. It has to be wholeness and that's really what this book is about. It's about wholeness. It's about the wholeness and coming together as we live before God, body, soul and spirit that we begin to live, what we believe and believe what we live. It's a great cure for hypocrisy and skin deep Christianity. You've all met with that and you've experienced it, skin deep Christianity where you say you're a Christian, you have all the titles and you have the identification but it doesn't show up in the depths of your heart and your daily life and your attitudes and what he is writing for, the cure for that kind of fragmentation is holiness because holiness brings wholeness, holiness through and through in belief and character and attitude and conduct.

That's what James is getting to. So you can tell this is going to be one of those books that's going to hit us right between the eyes. He's going to come after us. Today we're going to look specifically in this first part, not only in God's purpose in your trials but also your responsibility in your trials. You can go through great trials and not grow a bit from it. You've experienced that where you've gone through deep trials and you thought, well God's wanting me to grow but you got out the other side and you realize you know I haven't grown a bit. If anything I've read so graded I'm finding it higher to live the Christian life. Why is that? Well because we have certain responsibilities. It's not the trials that cause you to grow.

It's what you do with the trials and that's what we want to look at this morning this first few verses. Notice how the book opens. I'm continuing to use this PowerPoint. I don't know if it's a distraction or a help and I want to encourage you to give me some feedback. If it distracts us from the word I want to get rid of it. If it's helpful and it helps you to stay, somebody told me to help them stay awake. I think that is a great benefit. The huge benefit for me to look out there and see you white awake. I know there's something about that I love. Well James begins his letter. James, a bond servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ and the 12 tribes who are dispersed abroad greetings. Notice he calls himself a bond servant.

Now that's quite unusual because this is the brother of Jesus. They have the same mother, a different father but the same mother. The father of the Lord Jesus Christ was God himself. The Holy Spirit specifically was the one who caused a conception to occur in the womb of Mary but both James and Jesus had the same mother. Why does he identify himself as the brother of Jesus? I mean that would be quite impressive wouldn't it? That would certainly get somebody's ear. That the one who was speaking is the brother of Jesus but both James and his brother Jude who wrote a little epistle. Both of them identified themselves as servants of Jesus Christ. Not his half brothers but his servants. He could have called himself the bishop and the church in Jerusalem that's how I was known are James the righteous which was a title that was given to him by the by the people who knew him and yet he calls himself a bond servant.

What does he do that? Well because bond servant speaks to the issue of obedience and obedience is key if you want to teach the Bible. If you don't live a life of obedience don't teach the Bible. I tell myself that many times. I confront myself with that truth. If you're not going to obey it you can't teach it. If you're not a person of obedience then you should not take the position of a teacher. That's exactly what James tells us later on this letter. That those who take the stance the rule of teacher among the people of God have a greater level of judgment and they must be obedient. The reason that it's so important for teachers to be obedient and why James calls himself the bond servant of Jesus Christ and of God the Father is that the first of all the basis of spiritual insight and understanding is obedience.

In other words if you want to understand the word as you come to it there is a prerequisite. You must be ready to obey it. In fact one of the first things that he says in this letter which we'll look at next week is if you want God's wisdom from his word you must approach it with faith, believing with the whole heart that you're going to believe what God says when you understand what he says. And Jesus said if you don't approach it that way you will never understand it. The fact is many people many both believers and unbelievers come to the Bible and can't figure out why it's a closed book why it doesn't make sense to them why they can't get anything out of it. One of the reasons is that we will never get anything from it until we make a commitment to it.

Listen to George McDonald. He says what the biblical writers care about is plain enough to the true heart. When you come to the Bible and you have a true heart that is you have a heart it's not perfect but it is turned towards God and you want to hear what God has to say so that you can be obedient to him. He says it's plain enough to the true heart however it was far from plain to the man who is who is desire to understand goes ahead of his obedience. In other words he wants to understand the truth but he has no craving to obey it. He who does that which he sees shall understand. He who is set upon understanding rather than doing shall go on stumbling and mistaken and speaking foolishness. It is he that runeth that shall read and no other.

Some of the greatest heresies that have ever invaded the church. Some of the greatest doctrinal error come from men who are Bible teachers who didn't live a life of obedience. And that's what McDonald is talking about. The second reason is that obedience is the foundation of spiritual authority. This is what gives a person authority among the people of God. It is not rank, it's not title, it's not degrees, it's not even learning. It's the life of obedience. And if you stop and think for it about this for 30 seconds you realize as a believer in Jesus Christ the people that you seek to emulate the people you looked to be models for you are those who lived lives of obedience, isn't it? You can hear the greatest teacher.

There's a teacher in England, a Bible teacher in England who was a Bible teacher who was considered to be the greatest preacher in all of Great Britain. Body said it. Just a few years ago he was considered to be the greatest preacher that that nation had. He was a leading light in the church in England. And over a year ago now he abandoned his wife, his children, and he took up in a horrible outrageous life of sin. He even has a website on the internet in which he defends his lifestyle, biblically, a brilliant man, a man who knows theology in his head, but who has no authority in the church of Jesus Christ because he lives in total disobedience to Christ. When we discover that a teacher, a preacher, a leader is not living a life of obedience, we stop following him.

Sometimes we don't stop soon enough, but we stop following him because the basis of authority is obedience in the church. As I said, not degrees, not holding an office, not having a title, but obedience. In fact, it's the reason that young believers can have places of real leadership in the church when they live lives of obedience. And it's why older Christians can fail to be leaders because they don't live lives of obedience. It's key. In fact, Jesus himself said, if I do not do my father's deeds, if I do not obey my father, don't believe me. If I don't do, if Jesus could say it, I could say it. If I don't do, my father's deeds, then don't believe me. James goes on after describing himself as a bondservant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ to describe those that he's writing to.

The 12 tribes who are dispersed abroad. Now, this expression is rather the Old Testament. It refers to the 12 tribes of Israel. And the dispersion in the Old Testament spoke of, the diaspora spoke of, Israel scattered away from the land. Because under the Old Covenant, the land was at the center of the promise. And so when Israel was on the land, they were under the blessings of God and when they were scattered off the land, it was the sign of God's judgment. When they went into Babylonian captivity, it was because they were under the judgment of God for the idolatry in the nation. And so when he speaks about the 12 tribes who are dispersed about, he's using that as a figure to describe these early Jewish Christians who've been scattered because of persecution.

But there's a new spin on it now under the New Covenant. This diaspora is a wonderful word dispersion because it describes the church in a very specific way. It needs to be scattered like seed that has been sung. In the Old Testament, it was a picture of the people of God, under the judgment of God, cast off the land. But in the New Testament, we are called the diaspora, because it says something about the character and the nature of the church. Under this new situation, the New Covenant. The people of God now are not only Ecclesia, which is the word for church, which means the assembly God has gathered the people to Himself. Some have called us the unassembled assembly because we're everywhere over this globe.

And we've never had a meeting since the first century in which all Christians are able to get together as one assembly. And over this globe today, on this Sunday, this Lord's Day, people are gathering around in groups like this. Some very small, some very large. But we gather about because we are the assembly of God, not the assemblies of God, but the assembly of God. With the Ecclesia, the gathering of God, those that God has gathered out of all the nations informed as His people. But we are also the diaspora. We are the scattered ones. You see, we are an assembly that is scattered like seed throughout the whole world. It's always a disappointment when people leave a local church. But the wonderful thing is that they're like seed that are being blown by the wind to some other place and they're going to take up residence there and they're going to have roots that go down.

They're going to begin to bear fruit in another place. This is how the church has grown. The church has always grown through being scattered. Jesus gave the great commission. He says, therefore, go into all the world and make disciples. Guess what happened? They didn't go. You read the account in Acts. They didn't go. They didn't go into all the world. They stayed right there in Jerusalem. But they finally went. You know why they went? Because the winds of persecution began to blow and the seed began to scatter. They were forced to go. God brought it about. And you know, that's what happens in local churches. God brings pressures among us and he scattered us, scattered us with the winds so that we would go out.

Because what we have a tendency to do is to be only want to be the ecclesia. We only want to be the assembled ones. We want to build a commune. See, communes, as far as I'm concerned, are undiblical. Now, I'm not saying that there could never be a commune that would have the blessing of God. But in general, it's undiblical. Because God doesn't want us to gather in little communities and keep out the world. He told us to go into the world. He says, you're not of the world. In fact, Jesus and His priestly prayer in John 17 tells the Father, I'm not taking them out of the world. I'm sending them into the world the way you sent me into the world. And sometimes what happens when churches refuse to go out into the world and he brings situations into a church.

God splits churches. I know people get accused of splitting churches and sometimes people do split churches, but you know God splits churches. God split part of us and Paul. Because sometimes division produces multiplication. Sometimes the way that God produces growth is by causing people to have to go out. And when they go out and they're scattered, they take root and they begin to bear fruit. And that's what God is interested in. Now notice as he begins to address the first issue in their lives. And the reason he's discussing that the reason that he begins with his exhortation is that they are undergoing persecution. They are undergoing trials, not just persecution, but trouble in their life.

They are facing difficulties in their life. And so this pastor reveals his heart and he says to them, consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance and let endurance have its perfect result so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. Notice this. Here we have the first issue on his heart that he wants to drive home to these people because they are experiencing some great difficulties. And he unveils to us a very important principle. And that is that God brings difficulties into his children's lives for a purpose. Sometimes you're wanting to ask God, why? That's a good question. There's nothing wrong with asking God, why?

But once he's answered, you want to take his answer by faith. And his answer is basically the same in all of our lives. When we ask him why, he has a purpose in this and the purpose James has been unveiled to us in these verses. God brings difficulties in his children's lives for a purpose and this purpose can be accomplished only if we respond in the right way to these difficulties. Now I know that if you are a strong Calvinist, and I am, but I know if you're a strong Calvinist and you believe in the sovereignty of God, those kind of statements almost trouble you. That you have to respond in a certain way in order for these situations to actually cause growth. Well, the fact is, all of you are witnesses to the fact that you can go through trials and not grow an inch.

You can go through trials and go the opposite direction. There has to be a certain kind of response to trials. And James is going to tell us exactly what that is. In order for us to grow in trials, we must respond in a certain way. Can you waste trials as an opportunity of growth? Absolutely. Absolutely. You can face trials in such a way that you do not grow and you miss the opportunity that God is placing before you. And so James admonishes them and notice some things about this. What I want to do in these three verses that we're looking at, verse two, three, and four, is look at two things in these verse. God's purpose and our responsibility. Now this is a bit of an artificial arrangement of these verses, but it's there.

And so I want you to notice it, jot it down and think about it, ruminate on this. Think about this because what James is telling these people is you need to prepare your hearts and your minds for trials because they're going to come. In fact, he's going to tell us that in just a moment. Well, notice what God's purpose is in verse two. In verse two, he says, now let me get to James. I don't have my Bible open to it. And I bet that's true of you too. James chapter one, he says in verse two, consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials. Notice that what God's purpose, first of all, is that when you encounter various trials, that expression implies this, that God wants to reveal the truth about your faith in trials.

And you know, nothing reveals the truth about your faith like trials. Trials are so revealing. They are so revealing about the state of our faith, the depth, the breadth, the significance of it, the profundity of it, it reveals the true nature of our faith. And notice, he doesn't say if you encounter various trials, but whenever you encounter various trials, they're going to come. They're going to come. It's a promise of God. Philippians chapter one, verse 29, Paul says, to the Philippians for it has been granted to you these believers who were going through some difficulties. He says it's been granted to you on behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him. Now that sounds like a foreign language to the modern American mind.

But Paul is saying there's great benefit in suffering for Christ. It's a great privilege. I've been kind of amused and delighted with some of the conversations I've had with the men who went to Mexico a few weeks ago. And how it affected them. How it affected them in a surprising way. How they found delight in sacrificing in a small way for Christ in order to do the work of the gospel. A delightful thing, a positive thing, something that encouraged them. And in fact, it's done something and then that almost seems dangerous. They want more of it. They want more of this. They want more of this life. For this to be more of their life where they can live sacrificially for the cause of Christ and experience the delight of that experience.

In Acts 14, Acts 14 is a very interesting passage. It's the first missionary journey of Paul. And Barnabas and as they go out, they go through Laconia, I think it is in the and as they're passing through this region and speaking in these cities, they find some strong resistance. And I see a Paul is stunned and he's beaten so badly that they think he's dead and they drag him out of the city. There are some Bible scholars who actually believe that Paul died. And they got raised from the dead. They drag him out of the city. Let's go out there where he's laying just to be there by his body. And I don't know if they were thinking about getting ready to bury him or what, but as they're looking at him, Luke says he raised up.

He got up and he went back into the city. Paul went on from there to other cities and he began to, he continued to preach the gospel. Now the word had gone out. It would have been like Paul coming to East Contra Costa County, preach the gospel in Antioch. He has beaten to a point of death, dragged out of the city. He revives, goes back into Antioch and then he comes over to Brentwood to preach the gospel. Well, you can imagine that the word has gotten to Brentwood about this apostle who was beaten. And if they thought had died, but he continues to preach the gospel. And as he preaches the gospel in these cities, he tells these people as he goes back through these churches and they all know about what happened to him.

They know about the persecution that he's experienced as a result of preaching the gospel. And so he tells these churches, listen to what it says. They were distrinkening the souls of the disciples. That is, these new believers in these cities where the gospel had been preached. Encouraging them to continue in the faith and saying through many tribulations, we must enter the kingdom of God. There are going to be tribulations. There are going to be troubles. Now, some people want to know, are there going to be more troubles than there are? Before I was saved, I had troubles before I came to Christ, before I became a disciple of follower of Jesus Christ. So they're going to be more because of my Christian, more than likely.

In fact, you're going to have the same old problems you had before in many cases, the same kinds of trials and tribulations. And yet there's going to be a whole new set because you are a disciple of Jesus Christ. And notice what he says here, that we ought to do this when you encounter various trials. The word encounter here means to fall into. It's the word that Jesus used when he's telling the parable about the good Samaritan and about the man who went on the journey. And he falls among thieves. They surround him and they do him in. They beat him up and leave him for death. That's the word that's used here. It's the picture of a person being surrounded by thieves on all sides with no way of escape.

In other words, here's one of the promises. We often sing standing on the promises. Well, here's one of the promises. You're going to suffer tribulation. And tribulations are going to be fall you. Now, I believe that primarily, this is the word to those who are serious about being a disciple of Jesus Christ. I think it's written to those who are following Christ as his disciple. Now, it's possible. And this is the reason some people check out of being serious about following Christ is because it causes too many problems. There are those in this world who are persecuted physically in a very severe way because of their identification with Christ. And many of them are tempted to abandon this falling of Christ in order to escape the persecution.

But I think what James is telling them is that as you follow Christ wherever you go and they are being blown about, he says you are going to fall into trials, tribulation, pressures. He says these trials that come upon you use the word here that means to be tested in order to discover what a thing is. Sometimes you have to sing something in to be tested. Maybe you're water or the soil or something else. And the purpose of it is to put it through a test in order to discover or in order to manifest or demonstrate the quality of that thing. And that's what this word means, pyrodzo. It means to test something in order to demonstrate the quality of it. And he says that we are going to fall into various kinds of trials that demonstrate the true nature of our faith.

God doesn't need to know that because he knows the true nature of your faith. There's nobody in this room that God does not know your heart perfectly. But there are many of you here that don't know your own heart. And there are many here who are aware of your heart but nobody else knows about what's going on in your heart. There are many of us who can look like Christians and smell like Christians and live our lives like Christians and yet inside in the heart something else is going on. And so these tests are designed to reveal the truth about our faith. And he says they are variegated. They're various. This is the word that's used in the Greek translation, the Old Testament, for Joseph's mini-colored coat.

You see trials come in many various ways, don't they? If we went around the room this morning and they say, okay, why don't you tell us your last trial? Some of you could say, well, yesterday, this is what happened to me. And some of you say, well, six months ago, we went through a very difficult time. And we would be amazed at the great variety, huge variety among us. Well, he says there are going to be many. And you could think of a hundred. Now, these believers were going through two major trials. They were going through the trial of poverty. And the majority of these people, because of the way that James writes to them, are experiencing poverty. They'd gone out from Jerusalem. They had tried to establish or live somewhere else.

Some of them went up into Antioch. We were told in the book of Acts. They began to go into this foreign land and to establish themselves. And many of them were experiencing severe poverty. And some of them were experiencing religious persecution because they were followers of Christ. They were being persecuted by fellow Jews who didn't believe that Jesus was the Messiah. And some of them in power and some of them who were rich persecuted these Christians. And that persecution caused them to go through poverty. They lost their possessions because they were followers of Jesus Christ. Now, we have, we experience all kinds, variegated trials, trials that relate to our job, our finances, our help, relationships, family, mistreatment by people, failure.

You ever gone through that where you tried so hard, you fell flat on your face, and you think, what God, what are you doing? I put everything I could into it. I did it your way. I prayed to you. I sought your will. And yet I have experienced absolute failure or bad choices. Why'd you let me make that choice? You ever have buyers remorse? You went out and bought something in the heat of the moment. The next day you woke up and thought, what in the world have I done? What am I doing buying a $58,000 car when I make $23,000 a year? At 28% interest. What I do is bad choices. We suffer all kinds of things or persecution at times. In Mexico, there are Christians who are being persecuted in southern Mexico in a severe way.

Pastors murdered. One church down there, a pastor was killed, and his body was hung in front of the church, and they put a note. The next pastor that you hire is going to experience the same thing. So Christians around the world experience all kinds of persecutions. We fall into persecutions. We fall into trials and troubles. Sometimes it's because of our stand for Christ. Sometimes it's because we're just alive in a fallen world. But we experience troubles and trials. And God's purpose is to reveal our faith, the reality of our faith. What's our responsibility? Our responsibility is to rejoice. But notice, it's to rejoice thoughtfully. Now that's important. It's not to be a dingbat. And every time something bad happens to you, you giggle and say, oh, this is wonderful.

They're going to represent their house next week. But we are to rejoice thoughtfully. He says we are to consider it all joy. The idea of that word, consider, is to call, it calls for a thoughtful examination and evaluation of the true nature of this thing. And it leads to a life controlling assumption about trials. See, that's what we need. We need to develop this assumption about life and about trials while we're not in the trial. Before the trial befalls us, we need to come to have this mindset so that when they come, we can consider it all joy, not feel it all joy, the considered all joy. This word is used in Hebrews 11 describing Moses that he considered the reproach of Christ greater than the riches of the treasures of Egypt for he was looking to the reward.

In other words, Moses was willing to lose everything in order to follow God and the promise of Messiah. He considered it. And so he tells us, we must consider trials as joyful. Now, when he says pure joy, I used to say this means joy and nothing but joy, but that's not exactly what it means. And I have come to realize that really is misleading. Trials are burdensome. We are told in the book of Hebrews that there are times when we are in trials, they are not enjoyable at all. We weep and we hurt and we grieve. But what are you saying is we are to see it as we are to consider to be pure joy because of what these trials are going to work out in our lives. It's hard for people to grasp this because they think that the trial they are going through doesn't fit this category.

Maybe you're having a marital problem, for example. Maybe you're going through a great difficulty in your marriage in your relationship and you think this is not one of those trials that produces faith. This is just pure pain. Wrong. You're to consider it pure joy when you fall into every kind of trial. Trials should be the occasion for genuine rejoicing. God's ready to deal with something in my life. He's ready to show me the truth about my faith and he's ready to do something about it. So it's not how you feel in the trial because Hebrews says for the moment it seems not to be joyful but sorrowful because not how you feel in the trial, but it's how you evaluate the trial and light of God's promise and purpose.

God has a purpose in your trial. Hard, hard to grasp this. If you have a child who raises up and rebels against you and fights against you and goes to war with you after you've raised them under the authority of the gospel, how could you possibly consider it joy only if you believe God's purpose? Only if you believe that's under this sovereign control of a loving father in heaven in your life. That's the only way. But that's exactly what James is calling upon them to do. Consider it joy. So that's God's purpose to reveal your faith and our responsibility to rejoice. To rejoice, thoughtfully. To rejoice because you know God has a good purpose in this and he's going to work out his purpose in a glorious way.

In verse 3, James says, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. What's God's purpose? It's to refine your faith. The word for testing here, Dachmian is a word that's very unique in Scripture. It's only used three times in the New Testament and twice in the Old. Unusual words, not used often, but it has this sense. It in Psalm 12, verse 6, the Greek translation of that Psalm, it's used to translate the word refine. It's silver tried in the furnace when the earth refined seven times. It's used to describe the process of refining gold or silver. And that's what this word means. This word that's translated testing, the testing of your faith. It is the refining of your faith. Now here's the thing about this refining process.

The way it works in Old Testament and New Testament times, I have no idea how they do it today. I assume it's a very similar parallel kind of process, but they would apply heat, first of all, fire. And just like fire was used to refine gold and silver, God says, pain is used to refine your faith. Pain. For that rocking movie, when they asked Mr. T about, I'm sorry, I didn't you shouldn't let you know I watched the rocking movie, but you remember when they asked Mr. T what his prediction for the fight was and he said, pain. What's my prediction for your trials? Pain, because pain is the heat that God is going to use as a refiner. And this refining process did this. First of all, the heat revealed the impurities in the gold or silver.

And because it was in a liquid form because of the heat, the refiner was able to screen off the impurities. And then he would let it harden. He would refine it this way. The refining process was the removal of these impurities. And then the gold or silver would be hardened again. And this process was repeated over and over and over again. That's not to encourage anything. I was in the midst of a severe trial in my life. I mean, the worst trial of my whole life. It felt like and still feels like as I look back on it and a lady called me out of a clear blue, I hadn't talked to in 10 years. And she said, I just been thinking about you. Didn't know where you were. And you know, she kind of pursued discovered where I was at.

She called me and she said, how's it going? And so I began to tell her about the refiner's fire that was in my life. I began to describe this trial. And she goes, well, you know what? I've learned a lot about trials over the years. Let me share a couple of things with you. First of all, the older you get, the closer the trials are to each other. All wonderful. Isn't that great? Why is that? Oh, because he's refining your faith. He's making your faith more pure. It's interesting in our youth. I started following Christ as a little bitty boy. And I remember thinking before my teenage years, what a righteous person I was. I used to always get stars on the chart in Sunday School. My mother was a very serious believer.

And then I hit those years and my faith began to be tested. And I look back at all these tests, all these stages of refinement of my faith. And I can see what a dunderhead I was when I thought I was so smart. I always get tickled at young believers about their naivete, about the state of their faith. God's a wonderful teacher. And he's refining you. And sometimes he accelerates this program because he has a great work for you. Sometimes people go through great, great testings very early on in their Christian life because God has things he wants to do with them and he's preparing their faith. And so he puts the heat on. And sometimes really uncomfortable. But that's how God does. And then this is the way that the refiner would test the purity of the goal.

And that was as he continued to do this process when the goal would become liquefied under the heat. The refiner would look down into the pot. And when he would see his reflection, he could tell the purity of the goal. The more pure the goal, the clearer the reflection. Now, doesn't that fit well? As Jesus looks down into your life as you go through these trials and he applies the heat, as he brings these trials into your life, custom made, and they befall you. And he heats it up. This pain comes. The faith is put into this form and the impurities are so visible. And you know, that's the most painful part about trials, I think, is that when the heat comes and you see the truth about the state of your faith, it kills you.

You know, it hurts so bad. I thought I was so much more mature than that. I didn't think I could get angry like that. I didn't think I could lose it like that. I didn't think I could have such a rotten attitude. I didn't think I could, I thought I was much more mature than this. See what he's doing is he's letting you look into the pot too. And you're seeing the true state of your faith. But then Jesus, as he does this process and over and over again, as he looks down into your life, he begins to see his image being reflected in a clear and clear way. And you know, it really is a wonderful thing when God, when the Lord Jesus Christ accelerates this program in some people's lives. I know of men who God has used in a great way and who have suffered very deeply in different ways, gone through great trials, deep trials.

And it's obvious that those trials marked their lives because it was a refining process and their faith was increased and they were able to endure and to exercise faith in ways that they would not have been able to do if they hadn't gone through the fire. And their faith had been refined. What's our responsibility? He says we're to remember. And that's yeah, that's really the impact of this word when he says knowing this is a causal participle. It means that we could translate it because you know, because you're aware, because you've been taught and you understand that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Endurance is a wonderful word. It's a word that means to abide under pressure. Hoopo Manay.

Hoopo is upon over. Manay means to abide. To abide under the pressure. The pressure is over you and pressing down upon you. And that's what was going on in these people's lives. Life was difficult and hard and they were going through crouching poverty. But he says what God's teaching you to do is to grow through endurance. Endurance isn't the goal. Endurance is the means of the goal. The goal is to refine your faith. Endurance is the way that your faith has refined. You endure. You continue to obey God. You continue to do his work. It's hard. You continue to be faithful. You continue to obey him. When there's a million excuses why you can't because you're going through such a trial. But James says look you know and you have to remember this that it's endurance in the trial.

It's faithfulness in the trial that's going to produce growth. If you don't endure and you say well I endured you know I put up with it. That's not what endurance is. Endurance is an active word. It means that I stay faithful under the pressure. I stay believing. I stay active in my faith. I keep pursuing Christ when the pressure is on. And there's a million excuses why I should drop out. I love it when I see believers under great pressure. Not the thunder pressure. But when I see believers under great pressure and they continue to serve and sacrifice and follow Christ and everybody in the world would say they'd have a good excuse just to sit on the sidelines for a while and yet they grow through endurance.

That's what James is telling them. Verse 4 he says and let endurance have its perfect result. Don't bail out. You ever bailed out? You ever got into that habit where you're you get into a trial and then God's working but then you bail out. You flee to one of your idols. You know we all bring idols to the Christian faith and some of us develop new idols while we are Christians, idols of the heart. Things we flee to for comfort. Some people come to faith and their idols have been alcohol or drugs or immorality or materialism. And they abandon those idols when they turn to Christ but then when the pressure comes and the heat comes and the trials come it's like a knee-jerk reaction. I know where I can get comfort.

I'm going to go get loaded. I'm going to go get drunk. I'm going to go fulfill some lustful desire. I can't stand the pressure. See that's the option to endurance. Endurance produces growth. Dailing out. Waste trials. Trials can be of great benefit to you and me. If we endure and he says God's purpose in this is so that you may be perfect and complete lacking in nothing. What a statement. What he's describing here is the beauty of holiness. The beauty of holiness. That which is beautiful in our lives. Holiness. Now James isn't wanting to produce through trials and through his teaching people who are finger-wagging prigs who think they're holier than everybody else. One person said Christians are like to him reminded him of people who were on hold for the next life.

It's like they're not going to enjoy life now. They're waiting for the next life. So they're going to be miserable. Their whole lives here on earth. That's not Christianity. That's not holiness. Holiness is wholeness. It's happiness. It's beauty. And that's what he's describing here. The beauty of holiness. A life that has been brought together. That faith that's real and it's brought together. First Peter 2 to 12. He says keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles. Now he doesn't mean be illegalist. That's not what he's talking about at all. Excellence is not legalism here. Excellence here is something different. Notice how he goes on. So that in the thing in which they slander you as evil doers.

They made because of your good deeds as they observe them glorify God in the day of visitation. Some people read this and they think well yeah you know I don't smoke I don't chew and I don't go with the girls that do. That's not what he's talking about. He's not talking about that. He's not talking about a legalistic lifestyle. What he's talking about is something that's beautiful to see. That's what the word callus and excellence that's translated excellent and good is. It's the Greek word callus which means something that's beautiful to observe. A beautiful life. You see them and you see there's wholeness there that what they do they do out of their heart. They love it. They don't do it because they're trying to earn points with God.

They don't do it because they're afraid of what might happen to them if they don't. They're doing it because it's what feels and overflows their heart. I love it when we have people that come to us and want to go to the mission field somewhere and you can tell it's because they have an overflowing heart. That's how Dale Holland Beck is. Dale and Kathy. The most attractive thing about them to me is they want to be in Uganda. They want to give their lives to the work of the gospel in Uganda. It's a great thrill to them and every email I get is like that. They're glad to be there. That's the beauty of holiness and that's what Peter is telling us we should manifest. God is committed to making you beautiful.

God's committed to this but his idea of beauty is different than ours. It doesn't take plastic surgery. It's something else. Notice this Psalm 149.4 for the Lord takes pleasure in His people. He will beautify the afflicted ones with Yeshua. That word salvation is actually the name of Jesus. He'll beautify you with Jesus. When your life is whole and no, nothing, nothing like trials. This surgery of trials, that's what the book of James is like. It's like surgery. I was in the hospital the other day saying Hannah Piercy and she had an appendectomy or appendix had become gangrenous and so when they went in, they knew it's going to be a problem. They had to watch her close but they sent her home and sure enough of infection developed down deep and so she had to go back in.

I went and visited the hospital and here was all this stuff coming out of that wound. Had a horrible smell. Hannah couldn't figure out where the smell was coming from. It was coming right out of her side. Sometimes that's how we are. When we go through trials and this stuff begins to come up and God's doing surgery, removing this pus, removing this garbage from our lives. That we thought could coexist with our faith. Oh, we hate that kind of surgery but boy, does it feel good when it's done and He makes us whole and healthy and beautiful and that's what He's doing in our lives. He's promised to do it. Well, what's our responsibility? Our responsibility is to remain. It's to endure. Let endurance have its perfect result.

Don't bail out. What I mean by bail out is don't seek comfort in anyone else. Don't seek comfort in anything else. Don't get loaded. Don't get drunk. Don't go and throw your life into something else in order to find relief from the pressure. Endure. Trust Him. Consider it joy because you know that God is at work in your life producing something good. God wants to produce a beautiful holiness in your life. In Anthony 12, one of his books, he has a woman whose name is Miss Thorn. He calls her a qualmish woman and he describes it this way. He says her virtues are too numerous to describe and not sufficiently interesting to deserve description. That's how some Christianity looks you know. We hold ourselves all together and we have a certain look and we have a certain way of doing things and living our lives so that we look like everybody thinks we should look and all that but there's nothing going on in the heart and then we come into a trial and and all of a sudden it's revealed to us that there's something very deep here that's really wrong that God wants to work on and make a change and so he brings the trial.

Sometimes very painful. Surgery can be painful and sometimes God doesn't use anesthesia. You know he doesn't put you out. He doesn't kill the pain. He let you experience the pain because the pain is refining fire. Joy Davidson says one sanctimonious Christian makes a hundred unbelievers. God doesn't want you to be sanctimonious. He wants you to be beautiful and whole and holy and that's why he allows trials and brings trials into your life and so he calls us to remain to endure. Let endurance have its perfect work so notice this. First of all God's purpose is to reveal your faith in these trials and you have responsibility if you're going to get anything out of that trial to consider it nothing but joy.

Our rather is considerate intense joy. A source of intense joy because you're going to do something wonderful. He's going to change you. Refine your faith. Secondly, in verse 3 he says it is to refine your faith and we are to remember that it is endurance that is going to produce the good results. It's our faithfulness in the trial and then finally it God's purpose is to perfect your faith and so don't bail out. Remain. Remain. Under the pressure. Follow Christ. Obey Christ. Be faithful to Christ when the pressure's gone and you will discover he's going to produce wonderful things in your life and he's going to make a beautiful person out of you and beautiful people out of his people and so don't miss the blessing when the trials come.

You are going to fall into them but don't just enjoy them but experience them in a way that's going to produce great results. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you for this great promise. It's a life-changing truth that you have a purpose in our lives and that the most difficult things we face, the things that we hate the most often have a wonderful and deep and glorious purpose to them because you are working to conform us in a very image of your son, that we could be believers like your son, that we could be those who trust you so much that we would entrust our very souls, our spirits, our bodies, our lives to you and find the deep, deep joy that he found that would cause him to even endure the cross because of the joy set before him.

We pray that we be those kind of people. Help us in our trials. I pray for those who are going through deep trial right now. It's so easy to talk about these things. This is like the cleniness of theory but I know about the mess of reality. I know what it's like to suffer and hurt and be in pain in the midst of trials but I also know God that you're the only one who can bring deep and lasting comfort and change and good out of these horrible things that we can fall into. So we pray that your hand would be upon us today that we would respond to your word by faith so that you'd be glorified in Jesus' name. Amen.