November 5, 2023 | James 4:11-17 | Pastor Chris Baker
Good morning, First Baptist Church! If you’re going to children’s church you’re dismissed at this time. We’ll be in James 4 this morning.
Missouri’s most famous son is arguably our 33rd president, Harry S. Truman. He was in office for all manner of major historical events: the dropping of the atomic bomb, the end of World War II, and the creation of the United Nations among other things.
Aside from the big historical facts about his life, I have enjoyed learning about some of his eccentric quirks. If you grew up in Missouri, you might have learned some of these things in school. We didn’t spend much time on Harry S. Truman in Tennessee. If we did, I might have learned the S is just an S or that he owned and operated a men’s clothing store before going into politics.
While he was in the White House, he had a small sign on his desk that said “The Buck Stops Here.” The sign itself was made my prisoners at a federal facility in Oklahoma and given to him as a gift, but the saying had been around for a long time.
It was a poker term, allegedly. Frequently in frontier days a knife with a buckhorn handle, was used to indicate the person whose turn it was to deal. If the player did not wish to deal he could pass the responsibility by passing the "buck," as the counter came to be called, to the next player.
On more than one occasion President Truman referred to the desk sign in public statements. In his farewell address, he said: "The greatest part of the President's job is to make decisions--big ones and small ones, dozens of them almost every day. . . .The President--whoever he is--has to decide. He can't pass the buck to anybody. No one else can do the deciding for him. That's his job.”
(https://www.raabcollection.com/presidents-autographs/harry-truman-autograph)
The buck stops with him. That’s desirable trait in a president. Taking responsibility for decisions is important. That’s a quality you want in a leader. It's a quality that will probably lead to a lot of success in the world.
It’s a quality we’re likely to seek out in others or try to cultivate in ourselves, and that’s why I’m using it as an illustration today. Because it’s one of the ways that life in this kingdom and life in God’s kingdom are polar opposites.
James has pointed out in numerous ways over the course of these four chapters that the buck does not stop with us. We don’t sit behind the decision desk of our own lives anymore. We don’t decide our response to trials or temptation. We don’t decide how to treat people around us or where we go to seek wisdom.
Genuine faith submits to the truth that the buck stops with God. We yield our heart to His heart when it comes to how we live and how we interact with others. That’s what our text teaches today.
Here’s the big-picture idea, the sermon boiled down into one sentence: Genuine faith gives God the proper authority in my life and the lives of those around me.
Let’s read the passage and then we'll talk about how that’s true.
Read James 4:11-17
Pray
“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,” are the opening words of The Road Not Taken, one of the most famous American poems written by Robert Frost in 1915.
It ends like this: “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by.” James has pictured two paths for us in these last couple of chapters. There are two ways to live. You can live as though you belong to God, or you can as you belong to yourself.
You can’t travel both those roads. They view trials differently, find joy differently, speak differently, serve differently, and have their own collections of wisdom. Last week we saw the way of Jesus treats others with humility and the self-seeking way looks on others with selfish pride.
Today’s text drills that idea down even further. Here’s the dilemma: we want to be in control of ourselves and others. We want the world to live by our standard. We want to be in control of the actions and attitudes of the people around us and we want to chart the course for our own lives. But the buck doesn’t stop with us. It stops with Him.
The Bible teaches that God is sovereign, both other the affairs of the people around us and the circumstances of our own lives. And James is concerned this morning with applying that truth to our relationships with one another and our view of our own purpose in this life.
We see that in the first couple of verses where James points out that:
God (and not myself) is sovereign over the actions of others (11-12)
11 Don’t criticize one another, brothers and sisters. Anyone who defames or judges a fellow believer defames and judges the law. If you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. 12 There is one lawgiver and judge who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?
One of the repeated themes in James is that God’s people will be marked by how they speak. The words that flow from our mouths find their source in our heart.
Harsh words can have a devastating impact your closest relationships. Whether it’s your spouse, a friend, a co-worker, or a fellow church member, what you say and how you say it are key indicators of where your heart really is at according to James.
But before we address this I think it’s important to note what James isn’t saying here.
Judge not doesn’t mean what some would like it to. Jesus said in Matthew 7:1 Do not judge, so that you won’t be judged. James is just parroting Jesus here again as we’ve seen him do many times already. But Matthew 7:1 is one of the most widely misunderstood verses in the Bible. It’s the life verse for a lot of people who just want to live comfortably and undisturbed in their sin. They want to embrace Matthew 7 and ignore John 7 where Jesus says “Stop judging according to outward appearances; rather judge according to righteous judgment.”
James doesn’t mean that we’re not to exercise any kind of discernment or judgment when it comes to our relationships with other believers. He doesn’t mean that we’re not to evaluate each other’s actions based on the standard of the Bible. He doesn’t even mean that we should never say anything negative about other people.
And I can show you in the text that he didn’t mean that because right there in verse 11 he passes judgment on people who judge. James evaluates his readers based on Scripture. And we have to be willing to do likewise.
If you’re a member of this church, you have invited the people in this room to judge you based on the standard of Scripture, do you remember that? This is the second paragraph of our membership covenant:
We will walk together with brotherly love, exercising Christian care and watchfulness over each other, participating in each other’s joys and bearing one another’s burdens and sorrows with tender sympathy.
You can’t exercise care and watchfulness if you aren’t willing to correct someone. If you’re going to live your life as a follower of Jesus it’s necessary to invite others into your life to and give them permission to correct you when you fall into sin. Jesus said in Luke 17:3 Be on your guard. If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him.
James doesn’t mean we just let one another go on about our business without ever intervening. That’s actually unloving.
If we believe that sin leads to death and someone we love is engaged in ongoing, unrepentant sin sustained over the course of time and we don’t speak any corrective words into their lives that is the opposite of love.
If you were walking across Singleton street between here and Prenger’s after church, and you bent down to tie your shoe, and a dump truck was barreling down the road—that you didn’t see—and we stood by and watched without acting that would not be loving. James doesn't mean we just let one another slip into sin without ever saying a word.
What James does mean is that we should not engage in speech that tears down. The world teaches us to criticize. It teaches us to point out flaws and find fault. It teaches us to go down the path of picking at other people to deflect attention away from our own sins. So how do we avoid that? How do we go down the other path?
James gives us some guardrails in these first couple of verses. He reminds us in 11 that we’re brothers and sisters. We belong to the same family. The world tears down. God’s people build up. Listen to Ephesians 4 and remember that the context here is folks within the church family: 25 Therefore, putting away lying, speak the truth, each one to his neighbor, because we are members of one another. . . .29 No foul language should come from your mouth, but only what is good for building up someone in need, so that it gives grace to those who hear…31 Let all bitterness, anger and wrath, shouting and slander be removed from you, along with all malice. 32 And be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving one another, just as God also forgave you in Christ.
When you’re about to gossip about someone or speak ill of someone in the church, remember who they belong to. They belong to Jesus and so do you. The buck stops with Him, not with me. The only thing we should say toward one another is what is good for building up. That doesn't mean it will always be affirming, but it should be good. Good will mean saying no sometimes. It will mean correcting. It will occasionally mean screaming that there’s danger approaching. We should regularly speak words that are good for building up one another. That’s how life should work in the kingdom.
In fact, James goes on to point out that what you say about your brothers and sisters reflects what you think about God Himself. Anyone who defames or judges a fellow believer defames and judges the law. That’s God’s law.
If you speak against someone, you’re in direct violation of God’s standard so you’re not just speaking against them you’re speaking against God.
You put yourself in the place of judge. The buck stops with me, not with God. And that’s the heart of the matter. We want people to do what we want, to act how we want, to dress how we want, to like what we like. We want it our way.
We’re saying that our way is better than their way. If they’d stop doing that and do this thing I think they should do. If they’d like the music I like. If they’d read the version of the Bible that I read. If they’d vote like I vote. If they’d live like I live they’d be better. The problem is that makes us the standard. It makes us the judge and, church, that job is already filled.
That’s the gravity of the statement James makes here. If you tear down a brother or pass judgment based on the wrong standard, you’re putting yourself in the place of God. How serious is that? It’s the sin that got Adam and Eve kicked out of the Garden and Satan kicked out of heaven.
The things that we say reveal our heart. And a judgmental spirit reveals that we think much too highly of ourselves and much to little of our God. He’s sovereign, not me. He sets the standard. Our words can reveal a lack of humility, a lack of wisdom.
It reveals that we don’t trust God to reign in the lives of the people around us. And if that’s true then it’s very likely we don’t trust God to rule and reign in our own lives either. That’s where James goes next.
God (and not myself) is sovereign over my attitudes and actions (13-17)
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.” 14 Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes.
15 Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” 16 But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 17 So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it.
It’s not just destructive attitudes and speech James is interested in changing. It’s presumptive attitudes and speech as well.
Presumptive attitudes and actions are what we show when we approach God and tell Him how we’re going to live.
He uses a business illustration to make his point. We live in a day of Google calendars and FaceTime and Zoom meetings and planning ahead. The very mindset of the culture around us encourages us to approach life based on our own plans, our own feelings, and our own desires.
James is not assaulting planning. James is not saying, “Don’t plan.” James is not saying, “Don’t be good stewards of the resources that God has given you.” He’s not saying, “Don’t budget.”
He’s not saying any of that. He is talking about a self-centeredness that can invade our own thinking and can manifest itself in our speech if we are not careful. We default back to the mindset of our culture when we’re not careful, church.
In verse 13 he shows us a self-centered view of time. “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow.’” James reminds us that our time is in God’s hands. We can’t say today or tomorrow. The reality is that we can’t promise anything beyond the next breath. Our time is in God’s hands. The buck stops with Him, not with me. We don’t get to decide how we use our time. Maybe it’s the work mindset that got us there. We have work time and our time. But it’s not really our time. Our time belongs to God and He will speak for how we use it.
We will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there, James says. We’ll do business and make a profit. This is a one-sentence parable, and it’s an incredibly powerful one. This businessman plans out a year of his life. He would have spent time picking the city, putting together business model, maybe scouting locations. He knew he could go to that city, spend a year, and make some money. So, what’s the problem? He planned a year of his life and God didn’t factor in at all.
Church, James is writing this letter to Christians. We’d expect the world to work that way. Starbucks doesn’t pray about God’s Will before they open a new store. We wouldn’t expect them to. James expects lost people not to factor the one true God into their planning. But James is talking to Christians who are not factoring God into the equation. God is isolated on Sunday morning for an hour, but, in the business of world He doesn’t matter.
There’s no mention of God. There’s no mention of His Will. There’s no indication of prayer. There’s no humility about what might or might not happen tomorrow.
We can tend to think we’re going to live our lives and bring God along for the ride. Church, that’s dangerous. If you only want Jesus to take the wheel when things get bad, you’ve got your priorities wrong. If you’re not considering how you can be used by God and for His Kingdom from your day-to-day decisions all the way up to your major life choices, you’re getting it wrong.
James helps us see those things rightly in verses 14-15.
We don’t know the future, verse 14. We don’t know what tomorrow might bring. There’s a saying I heard a lot growing up. We’d plan to do something, “Lord-willing and the creek don’t rise.”
With modern roads and bridges, rising creeks aren’t nearly the threat they were once upon a time but you get the idea, don’t you?
Some historians believe that the phrase was coined by a man named Benjamin Hawkins in the late 18th century. He was a politician and Indian agent. While in the south, Hawkins was requested by the President of the U.S. to return to Washington. In his response, he was said to write, “God willing and the Creek don’t rise.” Because he capitalized the word “Creek” it is thought that he was referring to the Creek Indian tribe and not a body of water. I like that idea reminds us just how little we know. We don’t even know if the creek is water or if it’s another threat entirely.
We’re just a vapor. We’re not here very long. We like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes. This isn’t even our life to live. And the corrective comes in verse 15. Not so much in words but in a heart attitude.
Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.”
James isn’t just saying that we need to say Lord willing or if God wills or God willing, and that will somehow create a spiritual mindset. But, he is saying that needs to be our attitude of heart. That needs to be our mindset. And it if is, it will be reflected in our speech. We will be humbly dependent upon the Lord, rather than self-centered, self-focused and lacking humility. And this really is a humility issue, that’s verse 16
The buck stops with me really is arrogant, isn’t it? How arrogant can we really be when ignorant of the future, we’re finite, and our days are numbered. We are utterly dependent on God whether we acknowledge it or not.
James is saying something fairly striking. He’s saying that when you plan without factoring these truths, and without factoring in the ultimate reality of God, then you are being arrogant and when you are being arrogant, you are boasting, and when you’re boasting you are sinning.
James takes something run-of-the-mill like thinking and planning without adequately being dependent on God and prayer fully humble before him. And he’s saying that is, in fact, the sin of arrogance and boasting. And that boasting is evil. Christians should not think and speak that way.
But we do, don’t we? If we’re being honest. We say things about other people we shouldn’t from time-to-time. We don’t adequately factor God into our planning. We don’t even think about those things sometimes. And, church, I’m continually blown away by how dialed-in James is to the human heart.
He knows we do it and he knows we have a propensity to minimize it. Gosh, I just don’t do those things all that well. I’m hitting the big things though! I’m scoring pretty well on the commandments. Words and planning? That's like advanced Christian stuff. Maybe I’ll be better one day, but I’m alright for now.
Look at verse 17: So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it.
We can say “Everybody struggles with these things. From time to time everyone says things about other people that they shouldn’t say. From time to time everyone doesn’t factor God in his presumptions. Some of the best people I know commit these sins. It couldn’t be that big a deal.”
And, James’ response in verse 17, is “On the contrary, knowing what we ought to do and failing to do it is one of the best indicators that we’re living like the world, because, our failing to do it is not a matter of ignorance, but of willful disobedience and a lack of humility.
These two issues are signs that we’re following the path of the world and not the narrow path of Jesus.
As God’s people, it matters to us sinful it is to fail to do what God commands. God has commanded that we not be self-focused in our speech and thinking. He’s commanded that we not be destructive in our speech and in our thinking about brothers and sisters in Christ. And when we fail to do that it’s a reminder of our need for repentance and forgiveness and grace.
Look at your life, church. The things you say and the thoughts you think about the people around you on a regular basis. Are those thoughts that would honor the God who created those people? Are your words about them focused more on God’s Will for their lives or your will for their lives?
Does God factor into the equation of how you spend your day-to-day life? In the major decisions like where you’ll live, where you’ll work, where you’ll go to college, what sports or clubs you’ll participate in, how you’ll invest your resources? Does He factor into the small ones like what you’ll do for lunch today or the attitude you’ll work with tomorrow?
As he has done for four chapters now, James hits us right where we struggle. I love that he reminds us we need Jesus, church. We can’t sanctify ourselves. We can’t make ourselves holy. That’s entirely a work of the Holy Spirit. Overcoming sin isn’t something we can do on our own. We need continued application of the gospel. Jesus died not just so that we can be declared right in God’s sight, but that we can be made more like Him as He empowers us to overcome sin and grow in holiness. Let’s pray.
Questions for Further Discussion & Reflection
How does James emphasize the importance of our words and speech as indicators of our heart's condition?
What is the misconception about the command "Judge not" in Matthew 7:1, and how does the sermon clarify it?
How does the sermon define the proper way to exercise judgment and discernment within a Christian community?
What does the sermon say about inviting others into your life to correct you when you fall into sin?
How does membership in a local church protect us from ourselves, in a sense?
According to James and the sermon, what is the difference between speech that tears down and speech that builds up? How does the end of Ephesians 4 encourage us to communicate with one another?
How does being part of the same family in Christ influence our interactions with other believers?
What is the relationship between speaking against a fellow believer and speaking against God?
How does the sermon highlight the danger of putting ourselves in the place of God when we judge others based on the wrong standard?
What does James teach us about acknowledging God's sovereignty in our attitudes and actions, and how does it connect to our speech and planning?
In what ways does presumptive planning without considering God's will demonstrate arrogance?
How does James suggest that we should approach planning and our understanding of time in a humble and God-dependent manner?
What is the significance of knowing what is good and yet failing to do it and how does it reflect our alignment with the world's priorities?