Share This Episode
Cross Reference Radio Pastor Rick Gaston Logo

Room for Improvement (Part B)

Cross Reference Radio / Pastor Rick Gaston
The Truth Network Radio
May 29, 2024 6:00 am

Room for Improvement (Part B)

Cross Reference Radio / Pastor Rick Gaston

On-Demand Podcasts NEW!

This broadcaster has 1343 podcast archives available on-demand.

Broadcaster's Links

Keep up-to-date with this broadcaster on social media and their website.


May 29, 2024 6:00 am

Pastor Rick teaches from the letter of James 1:2-5

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
Clearview Today
Abidan Shah
Grace To You
John MacArthur
Focus on the Family
Jim Daly
Wisdom for the Heart
Dr. Stephen Davey

Jeremiah was notorious for going to God and making his complaint known and then he would come and share with us what his prayer was like. Remember when he said, that's it, I'm not going to preach anymore. I'm just tired of being persecuted for preaching. And he said, but it was, you know, the word was in me like fire.

I couldn't contain it. I can go to him. He's expecting me. He knows what I'm going to say, but he welcomes my dialogue.

And now here's Pastor Rick with his continuing study called, Room for Improvement, taught from James Chapter 5. So we are encouraged by that recognition to slow it down a little bit. We have all been impatient with someone else and after our impatience have taken stock of ourselves and said, you know, I didn't handle that the right way.

If I'm given another chance, I'm going to improve because there's room for that in all of us. Impatient people will not be patient with patient people, so expect that. Patients can sink into cowardice.

It can become, you know, just inactive now because you've sort of fallen asleep, lost sight of those important things. Impatience creates big problems. In the Torah, in the scripture, her impatience brought forth Ishmael and with Ishmael came problems that are with us to this very day. Verse 8, he continues, you also be patient, establish your hearts for the coming of the Lord is at hand. You also be patient. Impatience comes too easily, does it not? Just drive here when you go home. If you're the passenger, find out how impatient you are with the driver. Thus the side seat and back seat drivers were born. So he emphasizes this yet again because we wait either in the spirit or in the flesh.

That's how we do it. I don't know that there's anything else in between. The flesh is that thing in me that never likes or wants to listen to Jesus Christ. It is my fallen nature and once I become a Christian, it's still there.

It is the old man, that old nature. It is the flesh and whenever a Christian stumbles, we stumble because we get into the flesh and out of the spirit. We move from behavior that matches what we claim to believe. We can say to someone, I love you in Christ and really not love them. We can say to someone, I'll pray for you and don't go and pray for them.

And in many other such things, the list is endless. So you also be patient, not letting that flesh get the controls. Establish your hearts.

Well, it's because without patience you won't establish much. Listen to Psalm 27 verse 13. I would have lost heart unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of Yahweh in the land of the living.

You see, there he is with his eyes on eternity because that's where God's eyes are also. I would have lost heart unless I believed that I would see the goodness of Yahweh in the land of the living. The land of the living is the land of disappointment. It is the land of sin. It is the place of death.

It's here. This is the land of the living that he's talking about here in Psalm 27. But then he goes on, wait on Yahweh. Be of good courage. That's the courage that is linked to our faith and not just humanity.

It's supposed to be something that's distinct in the believer from those who are not believers. Again, unbelievers, they can muster courage, no question about that. Let's not let them outdo us.

Let's not let them outgun us when it comes to behavior. And so, he says, be of good courage. Wait on Yahweh.

Be of good courage and he shall strengthen your heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord. It is almost as though he knows his audience is impatient.

Wait, he has to repeat it to them. For the coming of the Lord, James says in chapter 5 verse 8, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. So he keeps this great expectation before the believers. He says, as we are serving Christ, he can come back at any time. The early church, again, this was a hot hope with them.

They really expected him to come back shortly. 1 John, John in his first letter in chapter 3, he says, for we shall see him as he is. John, who rested on the bosom of the Lord, walked with him, still did not see him as he truly was.

He understands this and he communicates it to us. That was Christ according to his humanity, but there's so much more to come and we'll get to see him as he is. He says, and everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself just as he, Christ, is pure.

There's a purification process that belongs with looking for, longing for, desiring to see Christ Jesus, the Christ Jesus of the New Testament, not our imagination, but of the revelation of Jesus Christ throughout the scripture. Jesus asked this question, when the Son of Man comes, will he really find faith on the earth? Luke's Gospel, chapter 18, verse 8. Will he really find faith? Well, I look at that verse and I say, that is a call to arms. That is a call for me to arm myself so that when he comes, whenever he comes to me, he finds someone that is genuinely desiring to have faith and to please him. Even when I stumble, I know the mercy of God.

I know it is there. I don't doubt it. I don't question his mercy. I question my goodness, my abilities, yes, but I don't question his mercy. He says, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. This, again, is the second coming.

Parousia is the Greek word. The phrase, the second coming of Christ, really doesn't show up in the New Testament, but that word that the apostles chose was parousia, that is here, translated coming, in verse 8. It means the presence, the presence of Christ. Now, it's not a wrong, translators are not wrong, it's an interpretive translation of the word, because maybe they felt if they said, well, because of the presence of Christ, you'd say, well, he's already here, he's always here. He said, I'll never leave you nor forsake you.

David Livingston's favorite verse, lo, I am with you always. And so, I suppose the translators of so many translations that we have chose the word, the coming of the Lord, as a translation of that word, parousia, which means the presence. James will keep it in context, he will then say, the presence is near, nearer, as in, he's coming, don't lose sight of that, each day brings us closer, even though we don't know the exact day. And, well, as a matter of fact, he says, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. There, the translators, at hand, is near in the Greek, wish they left it that way, but when we say the day it is at hand, we understand it is close by. And so, together, the promised presence of Christ is always with us, but his actual appearing could happen at any time. Verse 9, Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Oh, the judge is standing at the door. Well, he's not letting them get away from being mindful of Christ's presence.

He's at the door. Oh, how does that factor into this? Well, let's go back to the beginning of verse 9. Do not grumble against one another.

Why not? It's fun. The Greek word for grumble is to sigh or to groan.

The operative thought is against one another. Ugh, this guy. Can't you just go away?

When's this message going to end? If you think there are things in the church to groan about, you need to join the military. You really find out how much there is to groan about. Any of you veterans think it was just a cakewalk. You're lying if you say that. There are masters at causing you to grumble.

You know, the hurry up and wait. Colossians chapter 3 verse 13, bearing with one another and forgiving one another. If anyone has a complaint against another, even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. Even if you really don't like the other person, you must do it. It does not always mean that it restores the relationship to where it once was. But it does mean you cannot harbor a hatred, a hostility, a resentment in your heart.

You cannot host it, you know, bring in hatred and serve it, hors d'oeuvres and coffee and make it very comfortable. If you struggle with this, it's much better to struggle against it than to make it feel comfortable. If you find that you, you know, I'm just having a hard time forgiving this person. It's better for you to struggle with that and just to be, oh, I'm good, I don't like them and that's just the way it's going to stay.

That is not advised. Galatians chapter 5 verse 15, but if you bite and devour one another, beware lest you be consumed by one another. So Paul just says, let's carry this out to its natural conclusion. If everybody starts behaving this way, retaliates, biting and devouring, we will just consume each other. Sarcasm, it makes God proud, does it not, to be the father of those who bite and devour each other. It's good for us to bite and devour each other, it makes unbelievers believers.

Sarcasm. Lest you be condemned. Now the implication here is that the one grumbling is at fault, the groaner is the one that is going to be condemned. Now here's something that we might not discover early in our Christian walk, is that if you are impatient with God, you're going to be impatient with God's people. If you allow yourself to let dissatisfaction with God's ways grab hold of you, you will be dissatisfied with your walk in Christ and the walk of others in Christ.

And so guard against these things. I use prayer to fight it. I don't mean God help me not to grumble. I talk it over with him. I say to him things that I would never say to anyone else. Jeremiah was notorious for going to God and making his complaint known, and then he would come and share with us what his prayer was like. Remember when he said, that's it, I'm not going to preach anymore, I'm just tired of being persecuted for preaching. And he said, but it was, you know, the word was in me like fire, I couldn't contain it. And so I learned from reading that verse, I'm not the only one, I don't want to make it sound that way, but I learned from that I can go to him, he's expecting me, he knows what I'm going to say.

But he welcomes my dialogue. Though he may not say anything to me at the moment, when I get to heaven my prayers are preserved. In the book of Revelation we see the angel with the incense, representing the prayers of the saints. In other words, they're in heaven and they're preserved. They're remembered by God. I remember you were talking to me.

You kept talking to me, looking for me, trusting me, even though you did not hear from me. Outside of my scripture, outside of encouragements. I don't want to be condemned.

I want to avoid sin, and I do not want to. It's so easy to just be a grumbler. Anybody, any doofus on the planet can be good at being a grumbler. Woohoo, you go to the front of the class. You out-grumble the rest of your brethren. All right, behold, the judge is standing at the door. Why does he bring that up? He wants to say, listen, if Christ was outside the door right now, would you behave this way?

No. Well, he is. He's outside the door. That word judge, that gets my attention because it hauls in the possibility of penalty executed. And I don't want execution of penalty on me.

And so may we live like we sense his presence. You say, I try, but certain things come my way. I fold up. I crumble. Yes, but while you're crumbling, do you not still believe that God has the capacity to forgive you and still work with you so long as you hate the things that make you crumble?

I know I do. I would leave the faith if I thought God wouldn't forgive me. That's it. I'm done. I cannot do it. I'm done.

But I never get to that point. Because where sin abounded, grace did much more. There now is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.

And I'm staying in Christ Jesus. Verse 10, my brethren take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord as an example of suffering and patience. Well, patience and suffering, to me, they go together. And patience is a... Impatience is a form of suffering.

Patience, you know, you can get better at it as the years go by. And you say, look at this. I am riding this wave. I'm actually doing this. Now, don't get big-headed.

Don't mess it up. Because you can go backwards very quickly. But the prophets, they were unpopular. They were unpopular because they preached to the consciences of people, their own countrymen. And so Jesus said, Jerusalem, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one, the one that kills the prophets, and stones those who are sent to you. You talk about righteousness and the faith, but yet you're killing the very people God sends to you.

Acts chapter 7, Stephen, as they were murdering him, he says, well, right before, which is what triggered everything, which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the just one. Them's big words.

It's powerful words. It also has the deity of Christ in that, the coming of the just one. That's an Old Testament title that was exclusive to Yahweh.

And yet he assigns it to Christ. God's servants face mean people. Unfortunately, in this country right now, I think we face more mean people in churches than outside of churches. In other countries, it's just not the case. They face more mean people outside the church.

So you can be any either way. Just don't you be one of them. God's servants, they suffer heartache. Any of you ever had heartache?

I'm sure you have. Especially you older saints. Things that just hurt your heart. Things that make the moment sickening.

There's just nothing you can do about it. A lost loved one, for example. That's heartache.

A backstabber. That's not backache. That's heartache. It hurts.

It doesn't hurt my back. It hurts my heart. And many other such experiences. The prophets had to deal with these things.

The prophets, they spent their lives in war for truth against lies. And we are supposed to do the same. But we have to learn how to do this, lest we become...well, you've heard of a loose cannon. How about a loose sword?

A sword just flying around. How many Christians are like, oh man, I know you're zealous for the kingdom, but you've not been around long enough to learn how to use that thing in situations like this or that? So serious is truth that people have killed many people for daring to tell the truth.

We get that. Acts chapter 21, this is Paul's response to that fact of life. For I am ready not only to be bound but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. Is that not a beautiful phrase?

A beautiful word. I am ready not only to be bound and whatever that brings, the torture, the beatings, the shame, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. The prophets thought that truth was more important than their own lives. I hope on my drive home that my drive home is dominated by that thought.

I hope I think of that more often in my life. That doesn't mean that I become, as a prophet of God, as one who speaks, for every believer is one who speaks the truth of God in this context that I'm using it. It doesn't mean we're reckless with the truth we have, quite the opposite.

We're very careful. We're led by the Spirit of God Himself. He is our leader, our Lord, our Master. Satan injects lies into everything about God because of his great hatred for God, for God's truth. Jesus said, and we all know this verse, blessed are you when they revile and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My name's sake.

Have any of you ever had anyone say things about you that were mean and nasty because of your faith? It hurts. You feel it. It's not like, oh, that was wonderful.

I wish I could find five other people who would do this to me. Jesus said, rejoice. You go, huh?

Sorry, that sounded like I have had, like I've been there. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward, not here in heaven. That's what He says, in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. You belong to an exclusive club of believers. And so, when He says, My brethren, take the prophets, for example.

Consider the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord as an example of suffering and patience. Well, I like to read about that. I just don't want to go through any of it. I don't want to be steeped in getting stoned for preaching a really good sermon. Don't worry about that, Rick.

You won't ever have that problem. Okay, enough laughing. That's enough. Well, as an example of suffering. Well, patience, again, self-restraint.

We understand that. It's self-restraint for the moment, but endurance is long-term self-restraint. That's when we get to find out if your patience is really from the Lord. Or is it just this, and that was it, to endure.

It means to withstand the intensity that accompanies prolonged strife, pressure, constant pressure, long-term pressure. So if you put the two together, patience and endurance, you end up with long-suffering. That's what we do with each other.

We are supposed to. Colossians, chapter 1, strengthen with all might, according to his glorious power, for all patience and long-suffering with joy. That doesn't fit well.

There seems to be a contradiction there. Long-suffering, not short-suffering, with joy. Well, you better be spiritual if you're going to pull this one off.

You better be looking to walk with Christ if you're going to have any success with this, because if you try on your own strength, you're going to fail. 1 Corinthians 13, love suffers long and it is still kind. It says love suffers long and is kind. Love does not envy, does not parade itself, is not puffed up. That's pride, self-serving pride, to puff up. Knowledge will puff up.

Some of you younger Christians, as you're learning in life, you're learning about things maybe your parents have forgotten, and you start puffing up because you mention it and mom or dad might say, Hmm, I don't have a clue. I'm glad you got it, though. And you feel like, Hey, I'm smarter than you. No, you're not. Perish the thought. You just, you have to watch out.

You don't puff up. It destroys. It does not edify. Thanks for joining us today as we took a deeper look into the book of James here on Cross Reference Radio. Cross Reference Radio is the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville in Virginia. We're blessed to bring you God's word with each broadcast. If you'd like more information or want to listen to additional teachings from Pastor Rick, please visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com. If you've been blessed by this program, we'd love to hear from you. When you visit the website, simply click on the contact us link at the top of the page and leave us a message. That website again is crossreferenceradio.com. Please join us again next time as we continue our study through the book of James right here on Cross Reference Radio.
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-03-23 15:19:31 / 2024-03-23 15:28:10 / 9

Get The Truth Mobile App and Listen to your Favorite Station Anytime