Would you take your Bibles, please, and open them to James, chapter five, James, chapter five, where James talks to us this morning about a generous life, about money and wealth, a subject that men and women will always struggle with. In the world in which James was born, James being the brother of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the Greco-Roman world, which was the world of the New Testament church, caring for the poor and compassion for the oppressed were things that were just not in the moral imagination of the men and women of the world. There was no place in their thinking about gods who cared for the poor. In fact, in the Greek and in the Roman mindset, gods cared only for the rich and the people that they did not care for were poor. Contrasting this view was the view of the Jew. His God, Jehovah, always decided from ancient days past to define himself as the father of the fatherless, the husband to the widow, the protector of the defenseless, and the provider to the poor. And yet even in the Jewish mind, there was confusion about the place of money and wealth and their expression of their faith. Helen Rhee is the Associate Professor of Church History at Westmont College. She's written a fascinating book called Loving the Poor, Saving the Rich, Wealth, Poverty, and Early Christian Formation. And she says that in the Old Testament, there were four streams of thought about money that impregnated the average Jewish mind, including that of James and Jesus Christ. The one view is that God is the protector of the downtrodden and the champion of the poor. That can't be denied. It was God who always favored the youngest son making him the heir. Always gave children to the barren widow or to the unloved wife. He was the one who allowed David to slay Goliath and took the least of all people, the Jews, and made them the incubator for the greatest of all men, Jesus Christ. But there was also the idea that money has covenantal perspectives in it. That God, according to Deuteronomy, would bless those who were obedient with wealth or prosperity, at least, and he would curse those who were disobedient with the opposite. Then as they moved on in their history and they came to the age of the prophets and the poets, they were introduced to the idea of the wicked rich and the pious poor. There was throughout the Psalms and the book Wisdom, and especially the prophetic literature, the idea that the rich were the oppressors, whom God would judge, and he would reduce the rich in poverty and enrich the poor with prosperity. That led to the fourth concept called the divine reversal, that the first would be last and the last would be first. It's an idea that caught the moral imaginations of the Jewish people between the testaments. We find it in the mother of Jesus Christ in her great hymn called the Magnificat. My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior. Free has looked on the humble estate of His servant for behold from now on, all generations will count me blessed. For he who is mighty has done great things for me and holy is his name, and is mercious for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm and he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the mighty from their ways and exalted those of humble estate. He has filled the hungry with good things, but the rich he has sent away empty. Here's this idea of the divine reversal, that someday the poor would be rich and the rich would be poor. Jesus carries that idea all through his preaching and teaching. He says that he came to preach the gospel to the poor. In fact, when John the Baptist sent some of his friends to ask Christ this question, are you the Messiah or should we wait for another? He said, go tell John this, that the death here and the blind received sight and the lame walk with the lepers being cleansed and the dead are raised and the gospel is preached to the poor. All of these streams of thought in the Hebrew mind and in the teaching of Jesus Christ come to collision in a story where Jesus meets a rich young ruler. He's a righteous man. And obviously according to disciples he's been favored by God because he's righteous with all of his wealth. Jesus asked him to do a divine reversal, to take all of his wealth and give it to the poor and to become poor and follow him, which the young man simply refuses to do. The disciples say, Lord, if this is true, it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of an eagle then for a rich man to enter into heaven than who can be saved. And Jesus responds with men, this is not possible. But with God, all things are possible. Then Peter says, well, what about us? We've left everything for you. And Jesus said, you who've left houses and homes and families and wealth will receive this and many things more in the kingdom of heaven that is yet to come. There is the promise of a divine reversal. The confrontation in their minds between what we call a health and wealth theology that God favors and blesses the rich, but he disciplines and curses the poor and this great challenge to use your wealth in a righteous way. All of these streams of thought come into the preaching and teaching of Jesus Christ. In his book, Kings Cross about the gospel of Mark, Tim Keller says, the disciples came from a culture that did not see wealth as evil, but rather as the reward for moral behavior. They accepted the view that if you live a good life, then God will reward you with prosperity. This was their worldview. The worldview, for example, of Job and his friends in the Old Testament. They assumed the material prosperity meant you were living a good life and God was pleased with you and that the lack of material prosperity was the opposite and showed the displeasure of God. But Jesus's response to this young ruler shows he does not subscribe to these simplistic views. Neither is great wealth necessarily exploitive nor is it always a sign of virtue and God's favor. Christ has a different view of money. And that view that Jesus Christ had was inculcated in his younger brother's mind, the mind of James. James writes, in a time when the people of God, to whom he was ministering, Jews who had become Christians, were suffering through a great persecution. The persecution talked about in Acts chapter 8 that was begun by the Apostle Paul. And James is writing to people who've lost their jobs. Their spouses have divorced them because they became Christians and if they were a woman that meant they were now relegated to abject poverty with no recourse to any social or legal right to the inheritance or to support. They'd had their homes taken from them. Their businesses confiscated without remuneration. They've been driven from Palestine and lived now as he says in the opening verses of his epistles scattered throughout the Mediterranean world. And they continued to labor now under a persecution that was growing and gaining momentum throughout the Roman Empire, causing them difficulty. And all of these ideas was swirling around them about wealth and money in their own support. The lack of sympathy for people who were suffering in the Greco-Roman society. The idea that Almsgiving was only a civic duty for the city but not for specific people who rapport. The concept of the gods and even Jehovah, the true God blessed the rich and did not bless the poor. But the hope of divine reversals that a judge would come a Messiah who would make the least to be the greatest and make the poor to be rich. You see that reflected in the opening words of his teachings where he tells us in chapter 1 that the rich will go away empty handed and the poor will become rich. He has in his mind and in his hope this divine reversal. And so he writes not just once but several times in his epistle about showing favor to the rich and being discriminatory against the poor in chapter 2. He warns us in chapter 4 that the love of the world can cause us to do all sorts of things that would cause us to walk on a way contrary to the way that God expects the Christian to live. And when he comes to chapter 5 he addresses the unrighteous rich and the suffering poor with more direct language than anywhere else except the prophets. Kurt Richardson says of all the New Testament passages about the sins of the rich. James chapter 5 verses 1 to 12 stands out. Moment have to go to the Old Testament prophets and their condemnations for comparable judgements against the wealthy among the people of God define a similar passage. Although James made no declaration about the hopelessness of the unjust rich he offered no hope either. If they were committed to their evil ways then God the judge had committed himself to oppose them. This is a solemn chapter hardly the material you want for Advent Sunday but it's where we are in the book of James and in our own stewardship season. And I would say it's where we are in the American culture. One thing that we cannot escape and as conservatives we often don't want to face this fact we just want to ignore it but it is true that in our own country and therefore in our own congregations of churches the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer and the justice is becoming more and more thin between the two polar extremes. So James writes in three paragraphs, three things. A warning to the rich an exhortation to the poor and a word about integrity to everyone. First he gives a warning to the rich verses 1 to 6 in chapter 5. Come now you rich weep and how for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth eaten. Your gold and silver has corroded and their corrosion will be evidenced against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. Behold the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields which you kept back by fraud are crying out against you and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of Host. You have lived in the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your heart in the day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you. James is writing to these people who are suffering persecution and to those who persecute them. It's obvious that in this passage the people he addresses in the first 6 verses are not the same people he addresses in verse 7. He says in verse 7 my beloved brethren he talks to Christians but in chapter 5 verse 1 he says come now you rich. I want you to notice the first few words come now you. They match the same words in chapter 4 verse 13 come now you who say today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade to make a profit yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life for you are a mist of vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes instead you want to say if the Lord wills we will live and do this or that as it is you boast in your arrogance and all such boasting is evil. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it for him it is in come now you rich weep and hell for the miseries that are coming upon you. Remember that in the original letter there were no chapter breaks these thoughts in these paragraph are tacked as we write today logically building one upon the other. We looked at these verses chapter 4 13 through 17 a couple weeks ago and we discovered in these verses this truth that our life is not our own it is a stewardship a sacred stewardship given to us that should always be under the banner if the Lord wills we're not free to go and do whatever we want move to a city and make a profit enter into a certain career undertake a certain course of study choose for our children what they're going to do when they grow up know these things belong to God who owns us because he made us he bought us again with the blood of his son Jesus Christ and is planted in us the ceiling Holy Spirit who makes us God's own children our lives are not our own and now tacked on to that thought beginning in chapter 5 verse 1 neither is our money come now you who are rich we use that phrase all the time come now come on if somewhat a statement of surprise and disbelief but also a little bit of derision oh come on you can't possibly believe that your life is your own you can't believe that all of the money that you have is yours to be used in any way you like so James is writing to people who at least doubts are Christians they may be he may be writing to rich people in his congregation I can't tell from this letter but at least he treats them with a certain amount of suspicion as the people in chapter 4 verse 13 that if they are believers they are living as if they are Christless people Christless in the sense that they assume the right to do with their money whatever they want to do Kurt Richards says how could Christians have fallen into such a state but James already has shown in chapter 4 how friendship with the world makes us the enemies of God and how money is a difficult temptation to resist envy and the love of money create their own worldview by which a person will justify any action in order to secure the things he wants and that's exactly what's happening here he talks first of all with a note of warning come now you rich weep and how for the miseries that are coming upon you what miseries with are three of them first they will eventually lose their wealth your riches have rotted and your garments are moth eaten your gold and silver have corroded and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire you have laid up treasure in the last days they will lose their wealth it will be rotted moth eaten corroded you can almost hear the same words from Jesus Christ sermon on the mountain now echoing through his younger brother who would have heard that message store up for yourself things in heaven where moth will not eat it and rust will not corrode and thief will not steal second the misuse of their wealth will be used as evidence against them before the judgment seat of Christ he says that in verse 3 it is evidence against you in verse 4 he says the wages that you took from your labors cry out against you and the cries of the harvesters reach the ears of the lords of hosts there is a belief a saying repeated again and again in the old testament new testament coming from the book of Leviticus let every testimony be confirmed by the testimony of two or more witnesses in the Jewish court it took three witnesses to convict a man of an accusation and here are the three witnesses the way you misuse your wealth the money you held back from people and the people who were abused by you your own workers one two three strikes your guilty the third misery coming upon them is that their riches have prepared them for destruction because they draw them away from God and into evil you have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence you have fatten your heart for the day of slaughter you have condemned and murdered the righteous person and he does not resist you it's a bleak picture it's one that we want to say come on come now pastor isn't there a third come now isn't this an exaggeration i think not if we believe that the Holy Spirit inspired the Bible if we believe that it sees life more accurately than we do then James along with all the other witnesses of the old and new testament warn us about the dangers of the love of money what does Paul say to Timothy the love of money has been the ruin of many men and they have pierced themselves wounded themselves with many of pain because of it Jesus said that we couldn't love money and love him we'd love one and despise the other we'd serve one and didn't they not the other but we couldn't love money and God at the same time the book of Proverbs is full of warnings about people who take money and use it inappropriately and we find out that when Jesus Christ judges men at the end of time he uses this great parable the sheep and the goats and the whole story of their judgment about what they do with their money whether they fed people when they were hungry or clothed people when they were naked or took in the homeless or gave to the poor Jesus and you did to the least of these people you did it to me and when you failed to do so do the people around you who could have been beneficiaries of your wealth you failed to do this for God wealth has a great part in not only how we live the Christian life but how that life is evaluated what he warns us about here even more specifically than the judgment that's coming the miseries upon them is these four specific sins that get us wrapped around money in the wrong way the sin of hoarding the wealth the unbridled purchasing and consumption of things you have laid up treasures in the last days of fraudulence cheating others to prosper yourself behold the wages of your laborers whom you kept back by fraud indulgence living in luxury and going beyond the constraints of both what is balanced and self-controlled you have lived in the earth in luxury and fattening your heart for the day of judgment and finally in justice that leads to violence you have condemned and murdered the righteous person and he is not able to resist you Albert Barnes says there is no sin in merely being rich where sin exists among the rich it arises on their manner in which their wealth is acquired and how it is used the Bible does not condemn money the Bible sees money in a neutral way it's how we use money that is the danger although according to all the writers of the Bible including Jesus Christ money has a great force over us and that force may be the greatest danger to our souls if I were to ask you the question wherein lies the greatest challenge to Christianity in America the greatest danger to your children's souls and the most powerful force of evil in our country today many might answer will it would be a cult or false teaching that would lead us and our children astray others would say it's sexual immorality that swirling around us and sucking the soul out of our nation some would say it's a supreme court and it's secularizing powers that are robbing us of our rights and our religious privileges but in none of these answers are true. Theologian James K. Smith says by locating the challenge for Christian discipleship in arcane cults or sexual temptation or the secularizing force of the supreme court evangelicals tend to miss the fact that the great tempter of the age is Walmart the tempter does not roam about as a horrifying monster but it's an angel of light who spends most of his time making us happy at the mall. What is the great danger? It's the idea in our minds that everything becomes a commodity and we are the sovereign consumers with the right to purchase and use whatever we want so that salvation becomes a commodity and the church becomes a commodity and Jesus Christ becomes something hawked and bought and sold and used in our pleasures and no one including God has the right to tell us how to spend our money. That my friends I think James K. Smith is right is the greatest threat to the American church it's such a land of prosperity that faces us today and that is why James is warning is so important to us now some will say well we're not rich oh oh yes we are there's no one in this church who's poor and there's relatively few Americans who are poor and what we call poor in America other countries might call rich but there are many people here to whom this message might apply executives and employers and bosses at work laying off older people to save money hiring younger people in their place and underpaying them disregarding how our duty to turn a profit might hurt the customers or our constituents or employees blind obedience to our duty to the stockholders without regard for the ethical duty of the common good ridiculously high salaries for executives while we cut benefits for workers eliminating jobs because of obama care rather than preserving gainful employment and restructuring profits and benefits so that people can have basic care refusing to face the American reality and the biblical atrocity that as the rich get richer the poor must get poor and that is injustice and that's what we face today here's the bottom line god makes some men rich some men poor but he makes the rich wealthy always at first and foremost all so they can help the poor not spend it on themselves it's to the poor now he turns in this passage and gives them an exhortation about patience verse 7 be patient therefore brothers until the coming of the Lord see how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth being patient about it until it receives their early and late reigns you also be patient establish your hearts for the coming of the Lord is at hand do not grumble against one another brothers so that you may not be judged behold the judge is standing at the door as an example of suffering and patience brothers take the profits who spoke in the name of the Lord behold we consider those blessed who remained steadfast you have heard of the steadfastness of Job you have seen the purpose of the Lord how the Lord is compassionate and merciful now James turns to the poor whom he calls his brothers twice in this passage his fellow Christians and he commends them to patience notice that he also mentions judgment here he tells them that the judge is standing right at the door not the judge who's going to judge the rich he handled that in the first six verses but the judge who's going to judge them for when Jesus Christ comes to judge according to the book of Revelation he will judge the great and the small the rich and the poor the living and the dead they will be judged these poor people by how they looked at life in their poverty whether they grumbled against one another and grumbled against the Lord so he tells them to do three things he tells them to use restraint to refocus and to renew their perspective altogether first he says use restraint calls them to a life of patience be patient I know it's hard to be poor I know it's hard to see the richer getting richer and you getting poor and he says but you have to realize that the judge is standing right at the door and he's soon to come and you need to restrain your anger and grumbling some people will say well that's easy for you to say pastor you're a middle class white man and you don't have to worry about money it's easy for you to tell poor people around the world to be patient what about a good revolution do we have to wait until the coming of the Lord to receive our wealth and according to James apparently so that's what he's saying he's not promising them that the judge will come and correct things in their lifetime he's telling him to wait until the judge comes the second coming of Christ which is imminent he says the judge is standing right at the door what an awesome picture of Christ standing on the other side of the door between divisible and invisible world time and eternity listening to all we say seeing all that's done taking measure of who owns what and who was without and gathering the thoughts before he comes in judgment he tells them also to refocus their life on that truth not on the fact that they are without things now but to refocus on the reality that Jesus Christ is coming you know one of the marks of a worldly people and a worldly church is that we seldom think of eternity of heaven and we live only for today
but the source of our hope and happiness is never this life never could be never will be our hope is in the kingdom yet to come when all these things will be set right and there will be no tears or sorrow or death or poverty and a world where everything was the way God intended it to be in the beginning we can't hurry that day and we can't ignore it it is our great focus but some people say well pastor if you focused on heaven could you become so heavenly minded that you were no earthly good I guess that's true but you know I've never run into a person like that to be honest with you I've never ran into a person who cared too little about this world and thought too much about heaven so it must not be something that's a real thing for us to worry we could all do a little bit more for our souls and for our community if we refocused our hopes and dreams and attention on the coming of Christ in the new world and then he gives them a reminder he reminds them of how this has always been the case in the people of their Bible these Jews who'd become Christians the Old Testament as an example of suffering and patience brothers take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord behold we consider them blessed who remain steadfast you've heard of the steadfastness of Job you've seen the purpose of the Lord how the Lord is compassionate and merciful he says God is always rewarded the steadfast he's always punished the worldly he has always been a God of divine reversals look at Job a rich man who lost everything in one day and after a painful life of trying to figure out why God allowed a good man to have such bad things in his life he never answers that question and gives Job back 10 times what he had in the beginning God was mysterious and righteous and gracious all at the same time remember that he says this is the God that you serve who deals with the people who are your ancestors in his book generous justice Tim Keller says the Bible never says that God is the defender of the rich it always says that he is the defender of the poor it never says he loves the rich he loves the poor and while some texts call for justice for members of the well-off class as well as the poor the majority call for justice for the poor and those calls for justice for the poor outnumber those for the rich by at least 100 to one God is the God of the poor and he defines himself that way for a reason he wants to remind us of what he's been in past what he is now and who he will be forever in the future so that drives both the rich and the poor to one final word a word about integrity some people think that verse 12 doesn't belong in this passage they call it a dangling passage because they say it doesn't fit thematically with verses 1 to 11 or with 13 to 20 but I disagree it does fit with the first 11 verses because integrity and wealth always have to do with one another but above all my brothers do not square either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath but let your yes be yes and your no be no so that you may not fall under condemnation once again James is teaching what his brothers taught what Jesus said in the sermon on the Mount let your ye be ye and your nay be nay follow through on your commitments what commitments if you're a boss to pay a fair days wage for fair days work if you're an employee to give a fair days labor for a decent wage to file your taxes in a time in the manner and without cheating to fill out honest expense reports and mileage logs for reimbursement to pay your bills on time to repay loans to fulfill obligations to charge a fair price when selling good merchandise and to remember what you promised God when you were converted you told the Lord that you surrendered yourself and all you had to him when you joined the church at least the Presbyterian Church in America you took five valves the force that I promise to support this church and its worship and work to the best of my ability wealth money what we do with it always are involved with issues of integrity the easiest way the most powerful temptation there is to cut corners to tell lies to not follow through to cheat have to do with money what we do with our money remember the story of Ananias and Sapphira praise God that isn't happening anymore in the church but there was a man who had a piece of property in his wife and they sold it they wanted to be like Barnabas who sold a piece of property and took all of the proceeds and gave it to the church a very self sacrificial generous act obviously people thought well a Barnabas they made him a leader of the church so Ananias and Sapphira one of the same things so they sold a piece of property put aside some for their self and then came the apostles said this is the whole thing it's yours they didn't count on the fact that the Holy Spirit was operating in a direct manner then in the life of the apostles like it's not operating today and Peter said Ananias why is Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back for yourself part of the proceeds of this land while it remained unsolved did it not remain your own and after it was sold was it not your own to dispose of as you please why is it then that you have contrived in your heart this deed and have lied not to men but to God your money is yours to manage as you think God wants you to do but once we say we're going to support that missionary we're going to give this time we're going to we're going to support this particular scholarship fund whatever it is doesn't even have to be in the church could be support for Alma Mater could be gifts to the Red Cross could be pledges we make to somebody else once we make that promise integrity demands that we handle our wealth with honesty and anything short of that this sin I want you to turn to 2nd Corinthians chapter 8 for just a minute if I stopped here which I could then many would say you know this was a law-based message so all about what we ought to do and threats of judgment and shame on us for lacking integrity and you'd be right it says at the end of that passage about anonymized and survived with the gate fear came upon the whole church but we're not to be multibited by fear John says with by love and the paradigm for how we handle our wealth is not the world around us and not even the great saints of the Bible it's in the life and the testimony of Jesus Christ in 2nd Corinthians chapter 8 verse 8 Paul makes this amazing statement I say this not as a command but to prove by the earnestest of others that your love also was genuine for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that though he was rich yet for your sake he became poor so that you by his poverty might become rich this is how we manage our money and why because of the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and our life God so loved the world that he gave that's our father here's our Savior though he was rich yet for your sake he became poor and here's the Holy Spirit within us who comes to change the man or woman we are and to make us a people who are full of grace and therefore gracious why do we handle our money the way we do because of the love of God inside of us love that covers a multitude of sins including our sins of greed and injustice why do we give to Jesus Christ because we love him why do we care for other people's because God isn't doing into our hearts and put that heart of compassion in us what does the Lord require of you but to do justice to love kindness and to all come with your God this is not a thing that we do because it's the law although it is and not because we're afraid of judgment although judgment's coming what we do is not any more important than why we do it our motives are important as our actions and why we give why we practice a generous life is because of the giving gracious good God who lives inside of us and all he's done for us on the cross through Jesus Christ God loves us and he gives to us Christ has emptied out his riches so that we might inherit these unsearchable riches and be coheirs with him the Holy Spirit lives within us giving us this fruit of the spirit which includes a generous soul why do we give because we're under grace not the law not because we have to but because we want to and here is a reminder a source of grace a means of grace to help us become a more generous person we're going to celebrate in a few moments the fact that Jesus grace gave his body and his blood to make us eternally rich and because we embrace him and we receive his grace this morning that should make us gracious people when everything is all said and done and history passes judgment upon the reformed and evangelical church of America it is my great hope that they will say of us they did not do all things well but we have to say this they loved other people and they were generous because the grace of God was powerful in their life amen let's pray Father we want to thank you for the fact that although you are incredibly infinitely rich your son Jesus Christ became poor for our sake emptying out everything setting everything aside to bring us into these unsearchable riches and this immeasurable inheritance that we have as children of the Father no one could deny that you are a gracious God and now as we come before this table we experience another measure of that great generous giving spirit that you possess and afford to us Father we want to approach this table in a worthy manner a table meant for people who have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and baptized in his name joined his church and who are in faithful communion with other members of the church free from scantless sin and free from discord that would harm the fellowship of the brothers people who are giving and receiving living in love with one another Father in your name we welcome all those who meet these requirements to the table and those who don't we offer them this day the gracious gift of eternal life of a baptism and church membership of a new community of giving gracious people so that they the next time we celebrate this supper because of their confession of Christ and their entrance into his communion might be able to take this table with us while we receive the supper let your grace work powerfully in our life may the Holy Spirit make us more and more generous giving people carrying less and less about the things we purchase the things we consume and more about what we give away and how we are gracing the others through the wealth that you've given us as our sacred stewardship come now you rich come you poor and receive the Lord Jesus Christ and with him his generous grace this we pray and ask in Jesus name Amen