James 1:13-18
Let no one say when he is tempted, "I am
being tempted by God," for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself
tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his
own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when
it is fully grown brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers.
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the
Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. Of
his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind
of firstfruits of his creatures.
What temptations
are you going through in the moment? Let us take it that you have no job and so
you are struggling to support yourself financially. Are you tempted to think
that if you are dishonest or steal, that the Lord will understand you? Or perhaps
your husband has turned to heavy drinking, and so has become irresponsible and
careless (I can’t even imagine how trying this is), are you tempted to stop
submitting to him? Perhaps you have serious financial struggles and debts, are
you tempted to be dishonest in dealing with your creditors? It could be that
your parents are unreasonable, and overbearing, are you tempted to be
disobedient? It could be that your employer is unfaithful in paying your salary
or other dues on time, are you tempted to grumble like the world? This are some
of the real life circumstances that we contend with day by day. But we need to
be very vigilant. Do not use your circumstances as an occasion for sin.
In the few years I
have been a pastor of this church, I have seen a few people who are poor, or
widows, or sick or under other unfortunate circumstances, and I really
sympathize with them for these circumstances are no fun. But a good number of
them, under the weight and pressure of these situations, have been untruthful,
dishonest and sometimes even deceitful in order to obtain more financial help! Consider
your difficult circumstance in life, may I convince you that God is very good?
You need to be assured that our Lord is good so that you may be sure that He
will uphold you through all the challenges of life. There is no way you can
walk with God in life’s trials and temptations if you live in doubt of His
goodness.
The people that
James was writing to were tempted to use the persecution that they were going
through as a justification for falling into sin. Once you start thinking that
your life is so difficult that the Lord will understand if you fail in other
areas then know that you are in the danger zone. On the other hand, there are
others who reasoned that since the Lord sovereignly sent or allowed some trials
that have caused you to be tempted, therefore God has tempted me to sin. This
type of reasoning, which is very common with people and it is one of the
evidences that we are true children of Adam! Adam did not only blame Eve but he
also blamed God for giving Eve to him! But James in these verses clears God
name and absolves Him of any blame, (not that God needs anyone to clear His
name!) and shows that God is infinitely holy, too holy to be marred with any
human temptation or sin. Not only that but also that God is infinitely good,
that He only does good to His people. We must depend on Him, love Him and then
His promises will be ours.
1.
God is Good is
Because He Tempts No One
a)
Don’t
blame God
Let no one say when he is tempted, "I am being tempted by
God," for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one.
We are pot-training
our two year old son, Gaius. The other day I found his trousers wet and I asked
him what happened and he said that the dog did it. I reminded him that we don’t
own a dog. Then he responded that it was Asaph’s bunny that wet his pants. Then
I asked him how did the bunny come into the house, since it can neither open
it’s kennel nor our house. Then he said, Ruth, opened the door for the bunny
and then it wet his trousers. Patiently I reminded him that Ruth had gone to
school in the morning so there was no way she could have done it while in
school. Then he innocently asked me if it was God! This serves to prove the
little Gaius is as much a son of Adam as we all are. Blame it on others, even God!
No wonder when Martin Luther and his wife Catherine got their first daughter,
Elizabeth on December 10 1527, he wrote to his mother, ‘Dear lady, God has
produced from me and my wife Katie a little heathen. We hope you will be
willing to become her spiritual mother and help make her a Christian.[1]” Children
are not little angels after all!
Stop saying that
God is tempting you, because He is not. God is neither tempted with evil, nor
does He tempt anyone. It is not in His nature, to be tempted with evil for He
is the Holy God, separated from sinners. James appeals to the otherness of God
to show that He is good, too good to be unkind. Gordon Keddie so well puts it
here:
… all attempts to blame our sins on God, or His
sovereignty (the biblical doctrine of predestination), or the way he made us
(our temperament), or our circumstances in life (‘the breaks,’ people call
them), or other people, must be rejected. These are no more than attempts at
self-justification. And when God is blamed, they are blasphemies against His
perfect righteousness.[2]
b)
You
are the man to bear the blame
“Wait…” you say, “what
about the temptations that have weeded all around and about me? From where do
they come from?” Pastor James very wisely responds, “But each person
is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it
has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth
death.” (v.14-15). In fewer words, James is saying, blame it on yourself! In view of this,
we are worse than Adam and Eve who were tempted by the voice of the serpent,
for the tempting voice is the voice of our own sinful nature. James is responds
here as Nathan responded to David, “You
are the man!”
In these two verses
James nails the problem right on its head. The one who is blameworthy is you, not
God! You are tempted when you sing the tune of your own evil desires. You are
constantly hatching babies called sin and that is why there are so many
grandchildren called sin in your backyard and in your cabinet.
Sin is difficult to
deal with for a lustful man, who is swollen with earthly ambitions. Temptations
come in the direction of your desires. The language here is of fishing. So I
will freely give you some fishing lessons. When you go fishing, you must carry
at least three things, you must have your fishing line, a container to carry
back the fish and the most important of all, you carry the baits that would
attract the fish in your direction. You
put a hoot at the end the fishing line with the bait. When the fish smells the
food it will come quickly lured and
enticed by it and swallow it and soon the fisherman will shout, “Eureka! I
caught the fish!”
Pastor James shows
us that the life-cycle of sin begins with the conception of evil desires in our
hearts. These evil desires then give birth to sinful action in our lives.
Finally, these sinful deeds bring death and destruction. This is the nature of
the dreadful life-cycle of sin.[3] God is
very clear on this matter – the wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23). If you plant
evil desires and sprout sin, then be sure that you will reap death.
Therefore, will you
stop blaming God and blame yourself? Will you look at your own worldliness and
fleshly passions, youthful ambitions, covetousness and lust and tame them? I
can assure you that you can’t tame them by blaming others or God. Remember
Cain? He was told by God, “… sin is
crouching at the door. Its desire is for
you, but you must rule over it.” (Gen. 4:7) Cain didn’t and the end is
that he found the grandson of this dreadful evil desire - death. Amnon, David’s
son lusted after his sister Tamar and went on to rape her, but not so long
afterwards, he also kissed the grandson of evil desire, that is, death, by the
hands of his own brothers! From these two cases, there is no mention of the
devil as the temptor, even if I am sure he had a role to play in their
downfall. The devil is the most blamed creature, everyone blames it on the
devil. But be advised that the devil is not omnipresent. He is not all-knowing
either. The pages of scriptures do not reveal so much culpability of the devil
in temptations as much as the flesh! Therefore, James very strongly warns you
against blaming God in your temptations.
Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. (v.16). This is a warning given by a loving brother to
His brethren, for he would not want his own brothers in Christ to live in the
deception. In this phrase, James communicates his love for the readers and his
concern for them. he encouraged them that they ought not to be deceived. They have
no reason to be deceived when the Lord
has revealed so much by the Scriptures. We would be wise to drink from
the fountain of the Word of God instead of drink the poison of deception.
2.
God is Good because
He Gives Perfect Gifts
God is good because
it is His nature. This stands in sharp contrast with us, whose nature is to
sin. God can only do good and not evil. This is true because, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from
the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.”
From
this verse, we can say two things:
a)
God is the source of every good and every
perfect gift.
God
is extremely generous in what He gives. For we see that He gives every
good and every perfect gift. This statement speaks of both the quality
of the gift – it is good and perfect. Besides, reveals that the manner of
giving is good and perfect. It also underlines the fact that good and perfect
gift can only come from God and nowhere else. In other words, the only source
of every good and perfect gift is God, or God is the only producer and giver of
every good and perfect gift. Motyer puts it this way, every need is fully
underwritten by the endless and exactly appropriate gifts of God[4].
James
is reminding his persecuted readers of God’s goodness so that in their trials
they may not only realize that it is not God who is tempting them, but also
that they have God on their side to endow them with all His goodness and
perfect gifts. The negative statement, God does not tempt anyone is put in the
right perspective by this positive statement. For God’s plan is to outwork what
is good for them.
We must realize
that the world is not the source of every good and every perfect gift. It
cannot afford any good and therefore it has no good to give us. That which is
truly good comes from above, that is
from God. Only the Father of lights, who is the Creator, Sustainer of all
creation and the Saviour of sinners, is the source and a constant dispenser of
all good.
Why is God is
called the Father of lights? Because from him we have both natural and
spiritual light. Did He not say in the beginning, “Let there be light?” Did He
not create elements and gave them specific instructions about emitting light? The
physical light is from God. Who has conveyed us from the domain of (spiritual)
darkness into the marvelous light? It is God who is light, in whom there is no
darkness at all (1 John 1:5) and He has made us the children of light (Eph.
5:8).
b)
God is unchangeable
and dependable
God only gives the
perfect gifts and He is immutably dependable. James tells us that, God is the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to
change.
We know that even if the sun gives light so consistently, yet there are times
when it is obscured by clouds, eclipsed by the moon or too hot and
uncomfortable. There is no comparison between the Creator and His creation
because God does not change (Mal. 3:6). A.W. Pink puts this truth about God’s
immutability so succinctly, God cannot change for the better, for he is already
perfect; and being perfect, He cannot change for the worse.
This glorious truth
about the unchangeable nature of God presents the LORD as the most dependable
and faithful. This is what we sing in this famous hymn by T.O. Chisholm;
Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my
Father,
There is no shadow of turning with
Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions
they fail not,
As thou hast been, Thou forever wilt
be!
Great is
Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy Faithfulness!
Morning by
morning new mercies I see.
All I have
needed Thy hand has provided;
Great is
Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!
3.
God is Good Because
He Made us His own Children
Of his own will he brought us forth by the word
of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures (v.18)
This is the climax
of what James says in this portion of Scripture. That is, this sovereign divine
birth through the Word of truth has made us the firstfruits of His creatures. And
this is the supreme example of our faithful God’s gifts that we receive from
Him. This is speaking of God’s redemptive work and it follows the same pattern
of Paul’s question,
He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for
us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Romans 8:32.
Because God has
given us the Gift of gifts, all other gifts in One, then surely He will give us
graciously give us all things. … if being a true Christian inescapably proves
to us that God is good, then there need be no doubting his goodness in respect
of everything else that He does for His people.[5]
Two points are
clearly made from this verse:
a)
God has sovereignly
birthed us by the Word of truth
A number of things
in this verse leave no doubt that James is talking about the spiritual blessing
of salvation. In the previous verse we have learnt that God is our Father. Now
we learn that this act of God is God’s own initiative, for it is of His own will. This is sovereign work
of the Holy Spirit, and it is what Jesus told Nicodemus –
The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its
sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with
everyone who is born of the Spirit." John 3:8.
Who can control the movement
of the wind? None! In the same way, there is none who can control the work of
the Holy Spirit in convicting men of sin. So we say, “I know not, how the Spirit moves convicting men of sin, Revealing Jesus through the word, Creating faith in
Him[6]”
In this passage we are told
that we have been born again through the
word of truth. This phrase, is the most important piece of evidence in
favour of redemptive birth, as the instrument through which God brings people
to (spiritual) life… it refers to the gospel as the agent of salvation (2 Cor.
6:7; Eph. 1:13; Col. 1:5; 2 Tim. 2:15)[7]. Which
is not a strange idea, for the Holy Spirit gave the Word. And so James tells
that this divinely implanted word… is
able to save your souls (v.21). After
all Peter himself says that we have been born again not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and
abiding word of God (1 Peter 1:23). This spiritual birth by God is the greatest
blessing, is the best gift, and is the eternal gift by which we tap into all
other blessings of God.
b)
God has made us the
apex of His creation in redemption
The
purpose for which God birthed us or regenerated or recreated us is stated in
the last part of the phrase. For James says that it was so that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures (v. 18b). The ultimate purpose of all that God does is His own glory. But in
reaching this grand and glorious end, God has appointed the redeemed of the
Lord as the first of the beings to worship Him, just as the Israelites offered
their firstfruits as the mark of having realized the promises of God (see Deut.
26:2-10) so Christians are the ones who have been made the firstfruits.
What does it mean
that we are God’s first fruit? We belong to God in a special way as believers,
that is, set apart or consecrated for God’s use. He has not only owned us from
the first time when He created us, but He has also bought us to be His own
possession. As the firstfruit of all creation, we are the cream and apex of His
creation. Notice how Daniel Dorian puts it so well;
James says
God’s people are his firstfruits. We are the first and the best of His
produce’. He will prove faithful. He will care for us year by year, even as He
cared for Israel in the wilderness. This is what the tests should teach us. If
we fail, our failure teaches us to turn to God for mercy, as he offers it in
the gospel. Then as we persevere with him in love, come what may, we will
receive the crown of life that He has promised.[8]
Therefore, we must
acknowledge that we should be God's portion and treasure, and a
more peculiar property to him, as the first-fruits were. We should become holy
to the Lord, as the first-fruits were consecrated to him. Christ is the
first-fruits of Christians, Christians are the first-fruits of His creatures[9].
[1] Roland H.
Bainton, Here I Stand, A life of Martin
Luther, (Peabody, MA, Hendrickson, 1894), P. 299
[2] Gordon Keddie, The
Practical Christian, James simply explained, (Darlington, Evangelical
Press, 1989), p. 50
[5] Gordon Keddie, The Practical
Christian, James simply explained, (Darlington, Evangelical Press, 1989), p. 56
[9] Matthew Henry, Commentary On The Whole
Bible, (Peabody, MA. Hendrickson Publishers, 1991), p. 1934
