James 2026

If you'd like to turn to James chapter one, we're gonna read verse one to 18 together.

And then after that, we're gonna turn back in our Bibles to Psalm 73. So James one, page one, two, one, three. If you've got one of the church Bibles, James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the 12 tribes scattered among the nations, greetings. Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God who gives generously to all without finding fault and it will be given to you. But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double minded and unstable in all they do. Believers in humble circumstances ought to take pride in their high position, But the rich should take pride in their humiliation since they will pass away like a wildflower.

For the sun rises with scorching heat and withers the plant, its blossom falls and its beauty is destroyed. In the same way, the rich will fade away even while they go about their business. Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him. When tempted, no one should say, God is tempting me. For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone.

But each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin when it is full grown gives birth to death. Don't be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created.

And Psalm 73, page five eight six, a Psalm of Asaph. Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart. But as for me, my feet had almost slipped. I had nearly lost my foothold. For I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

They have no struggles. Their bodies are healthy and strong. They are free from common human burdens. They are not plagued by human ills. Therefore, pride is their necklace.

They clothe themselves with violence. From their callous hearts comes iniquity. Their evil imaginations have no limits. They scoff and speak with malice. With arrogance, they threaten oppression.

Their mouths lay claim to heaven and their tongues take possession of the earth. Therefore, their people turn to them and drink up waters in abundance. They say, how would God know? Does the most high know anything? This is what the wicked are like.

Always free of care, they go on amassing wealth. Surely in vain have I kept my heart pure and have washed my hands in innocence. All day long, I have been afflicted, and every morning brings new punishments. If I had spoken out like that, I would have betrayed your children. When I tried to understand all this, it troubled me deeply till I entered the sanctuary of God.

Then I understood their final destiny. Surely, you have placed them on slippery ground. You cast them down to ruin. How suddenly are they destroyed, completely swept away by terrors? They are like a dream when one awakes.

When you arise, Lord, you will despise them as fantasies. When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant. I was a brute beast before you. Yet I am always with you. You hold me by my right hand.

You guide me with your counsel, and afterwards you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Those who are far from you will perish.

You destroy all who are unfaithful to you. But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge. I will tell of all your deeds. This is God's word to us this evening.

Pete's gonna come and preach it to us now. Well, good evening. My name's Pete Woodcock. I'm one of the pastors. This is our third sort of look at James and we're gonna go through this book.

We tend to do this in, at the church. We take a book, we work our way through it. What's it saying to us? And one of the reasons for doing that is, so that we don't just pick our favorite verses and say only things that we really wanna say. We try to let God speak through his word and, and it can be a, it can be challenging passages and, you know, sometimes as preachers, you think I don't go, I don't wanna go anywhere near that.

But as we go through the book, we make ourselves do that. Let me just pray. Father help us now as we look at this passage in James, it's been a blessing to people right through the ages, write down different cultures. And we thank you for it. Help us now to hear it by your, by your spirit and apply it to our hearts in Jesus name.

Amen. Amen. I don't know whether you realise this, but every day you wake up to, well, depends on what time you wake up. But, the day holds eighty six thousand four hundred seconds. Sounds a lot, isn't it?

But there's another one gone. Eighty six thousand four hundred seconds before you. And, in that time, you're gonna have many, many, many opportunities. There'll be opportunities to be positively active or be positively lazy. There'll be opportunities to tell the truth or to lie or exaggerate.

There'd be opportunities to speak encouraging words to people or really unkind words. There'd be opportunities to praise god or to curse him. There'll be opportunities to be joyful or really grumpy. There'll be opportunities to lift people up or to bring them down. Those seconds are full of all those opportunities.

You're gonna meet people, all kinds of people. There'll be people you meet that you'll like, and you get on with and you wanna meet, and there are people that you'll meet that you don't like, and you don't really get on very well. And there'll be strangers you'll meet, you know, new people. And there'll be different circumstances that you're going to go through and different events are going to happen into your life. All kinds of different things.

You know, the bus is going to be late when you're and you're really frustrated because you want to get there early or the train breaks down or the traffic. There's someone's put up yet another temporary traffic light or blocked another road for you to that you normally go down. And it's it's it you know, all these things come before us. The truth is that we wake up to our eighty six thousand four hundred seconds and we step out into a day and we face trials. Trials of many kinds because all of those things are trials.

And what you believe, what you really believe, and what you live for, and what you live by, and the story that you tell yourself, the story that you're going to follow in those situations will be shown and exposed by all of those things, by all of those tests. And James is dealing with that. We sang it in that song. Amazing song, isn't it? Every day, there are many trials.

Just look at verse two. We looked at this last week but I just need to go over this again. He says, this is strange. Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters. Whenever you face trials of many kinds.

Now, we had a look at that last week, so I'm gonna go completely into that. But notice it's trials of many kinds because trials come in all sorts of shapes and all sorts of sizes. And sooner or later, if you're a Christian, you'll discover that the Christian life doesn't mean that you have an absence of trials and difficulties and tests. The question is not whether trials will come in your day. The question is, when they come, how are you going to think about them?

How are you going to face them? What story are you going to tell about those things that you face to yourself? How are you going to start to explain to yourself? What is happening here? How are you going to interpret the circumstances that are going on?

How are you going to meet the people and what stories are you gonna tell about them? And what stories are you gonna tell about yourself as you react to them? We tell stories to explain things. What is that story gonna be? We tell stories to to live by actually.

Stories about God. Trying to interpret the situation, don't we? Some of us, have been reading through the book of Genesis, the first book of the Bible, and we're on a little group and we've been reading every day. And the other day, we came to the stories of of Jacob and Esau, their twin brothers. I'm not gonna go into all the details about them.

But it's very interesting when you read it. Because they come into their day very differently and yet they come into their day to cope with their day, to cope with their trials and tests, the people they meet, not thinking about god at all. They start their day and they're very different. So you've got Esau. He's like a bit of a brute beast.

He's like a real sort of bloke who goes around with his desires. He hasn't really planned anything, but he's starving and he's prepared to sell his birthright just for some food. Yeah. And then he goes hunting because he likes that sort of thing. And then he's gonna marry anyone he likes, you know.

Then he finds out he wants to please his dad and his dad didn't like, you know, his first few wives. So he goes off and gets another wife. And he he's sort of going with his desires. That's him. He goes into the day facing all of these different events just through his own desires.

Then, his brother, his twin brother, Jacob, he's very different. He wakes up in the morning and plans and schemes and lies and brings deceit and he's gonna manipulate circumstances. Even his family, even his blind dad, he's gonna manipulate for his own benefit. You see, people go into a day, they face these things, and in their cases, they didn't think about God. They just reacted by desire or reacted by manipulation and scheming.

In fact, even Abraham, when we read his story, he goes into the day his family story isn't brilliant. He goes into the day, and there's a couple of times where we read, to protect himself, and he actually puts his wife in great danger to protect himself. See how he's coping with the trial that came into his life? There was a a man who was a very powerful man, and he didn't know what to do, and in order to cope with it, he wants to protect himself. So the day holds trials, your day holds trials and tests, And they can either help us to go to God and depend on God and the Lord Jesus Christ, or they can grow death in us and even tempt us away from God.

That's what trials and tests and all those opportunities that I mentioned do. It all depends on the story that you're telling yourself and you're going to tell yourself and you're going to live by. And that story all depends on the wisdom that you're going to listen to and take to heart. So here's my first point then. Which story are you gonna live by?

Where's the source of your wisdom is another way of putting it. Where's the source of your wisdom? In in this passage of James, there are two types of wisdom, two sources for the story that we can tell ourselves. Two roads you can go by. Two roads you can walk down.

Two sources of stories. Let me just give you an overview. First of all, God's wisdom. God's story. Now, in this passage and I'll I'll point them out to you.

You can see amazing truths about god. They're just wonderful. They're really wonderful truths about god. Things that if we're going to walk in God's ways, we need to remember about God. We need to remember so we can walk this story.

So look at verses three and four. Again, looked at these last week but I just wanna go back. We see that God is is is about our good. He's a he's about our good. He's a good God and he's about your good.

So it says verse two, consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let, perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature, complete, not lacking anything. So here is God and he's testing us to produce perseverance. He wants us to grow. He's a good God.

The tests when you meet those various circumstances or those various people is all about good. He wants to mature us. Everything needs to be tested. Every profession is tested, isn't it? We we say the the phrase, you know, no pain, no gain.

If you wanna grow muscles, you have to have a bit of pain and that grows the muscles. They sort of break and then re mend and grow. That's how it works. And that's what it is in life. You know, if a pilot was never tested, if it was just like, yeah, there, he looks like a bloke that could fly a plane, bang him in the, you know, cockpit, you wouldn't be on the plane.

Now that might be true with Brian Eyre. I don't know. But you wouldn't be on the plane, would you? You want them to be tested and regularly tested and make sure their eyesight is good and make sure they understand the instruments and make sure and testing is a good thing. It matures you.

It makes you good. And that's what God is doing. He's a very good God. These tests are meant to be positive. A test always hopes for success, but a temptation is the opposite.

Temptation wants you to fail. A test wants you to pass. Look at verse 13 again. This is we're looking at who God is. Verse 13.

When tempted, no one should say God is tempting me. For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone. God's not tempting you in these tests. God isn't about evil. He's not about you want he doesn't want you to fail.

He wants to mature you. He wants to complete you. He wants you to make make you like his darling son, the lord Jesus Christ. You go out into the world with your eighty six thousand four hundred seconds facing all these different things. He wants to you to rely on god and mature and grow.

God tests to strengthen you, to build up your muscles, no pain without, no gain without any pain. So, consider it pure joy. Why? Because god is working in you in that eighty six thousand four hundred seconds with all the events you're going to face. He's working in you.

He's working for you. He's maturing you. He's saying step out into the day. Don't just lie there and do nothing. That's you've already failed that test then.

You've been tempted to be lazy. But go into the day. Step into the day to grow you. It's positive, ain't it? Consider it pure joy then.

Look at verse 17. Look. We're just thinking about who this god is. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the father of heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He's father of heavenly lights.

That's who God is. In another book in the Bible, one John, God is light. In him, there is no darkness. God reveals things. Light reveals truth.

He's not a shadowy sort of figure lurking around wanting you to fail. He's not a horrible god that's sort of thinking, alright. We're gonna put a test in their way, and I hope they fall so I can judge them. That is not god. That is a lot of people, But that's not God.

He's full of light. He's the father of light. Suns, the sun comes and goes, doesn't it? I know, I know, you know, the earth goes around the sun. But, the sun comes and goes and it's and it's it's you know, it's bright sometimes and dull, sometimes covered but god is light.

He's never shadowy. He's never hiding truth. He's revealing it. You think of all the claims that people make in this world. Claims to help you live your life.

I mean, how many things do you get a day on your social media to tell you to help you to live your life? And some of them might be helpful, but most of them are just like fashions or ideas or actually to manipulate you into buying something. God isn't doesn't give us good ideas that are in fashion for one year and out of fashion the next year. God shines his good gifts of light. He's above culture.

What he says, he says to all cultures. Look at verse 18. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created. It's it's so positive, isn't it? If you're a Christian, if you're in Christ, you're part of his story, you're part of his family, you've been born by his word.

He's given you birth by his word of truth. This is really good news. He's life giving word. You are born in the truth. You are born to be the fresh living new first fruits, you know?

Of this new creation that he's making and molding you into. There's a new era. There's great hope here. You walk into the day with great hope because you've been born by god, by truth, to be grown. Into this first fruit.

Now, knowing all that, if you know all that, you can step into the day with all the many trials that you're going to face with joy. Because this day has a point. Everything has a point. It feels pointless when the bus doesn't turn up. You feel like having to go at the bus driver.

Not his fault, is it? But you feel like having to go. But it's all there. It's all there by God. And if you know this God, then you can face your trials with joy.

God is for me. God is my father. God is good. He's a parent that's growing me and helping me mature and giving me tests to help me mature. He's a generous God.

He gives good gifts. He gives wisdom. He's the only wise one. He gives me his wisdom. He tells me the truth.

He births me in truth. Therefore, look at verse five. If you lack wisdom to face the day, to face the trials, if you lack wisdom, you should ask God who gives generously. See, he's a generous God. To all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.

And we were seeing about finding fault. He doesn't find fault. You know, you may fail one day. He he won't say, oh, I gave you that already. We were seeing that last week.

Not to go into the day with that wisdom, to start the day by googling, to start the day by reaching for the phone and seeing what's on social media, seems nuts, doesn't it? Doesn't it seem nuts when we've got this wisdom at our fingertips? That's God's wisdom. Okay. Let's just have a look at the world's wisdom.

This is another story. This is another way we can step into the world in facing trials. Because if we go this route, those trials will turn into temptations and they'll kill you in some kind of way. And the source of this story, of course, is not the heavenly father. The source of that that story is the heavenly father, God's wisdom.

But the source of this story is our desires. Now, James does go on and he opens this out to say, yeah, it's the world's advice as well and then he also says it's Satan's. But he's specifically focusing in on our desires here because I think he wants us to see, we can't just blame the devil. Oh, the devil's fault or it's the world's fault or whatever. So look what he says in verses fourteen and sixteen, but each of each person is tempted.

The word tempted is the same word as trial and tested. It's the same word. So each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Actually, the word evil isn't there. It's just sort of desire.

It's your lustful desire. It's just your your your desires. Like Esau's hungry. And so he went for food and sold his birthright. It's that sort of thing.

But each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin and sin when it is full grown gives birth to death. Don't be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. The source of God's wisdom comes from the father in heaven. Like this amazing sort of waterfall just pouring down generously.

The source of this wisdom is self itself. As I say, later on, he'll show us it's the world and he'll show us it's Satan, but he wants us to see the self here. Their own evil, lustful desires. Now see what happens. It's a horror chain of events that happens.

It drags you to death. It gives birth to death. It's everything opposite to God's wisdom, to God's story. It's a deceiving destruction. It causes you even to doubt God.

It causes you not to trust him and you're gonna become an unstable person tossed around like wave. Look at verses six to eight. But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double minded and unstable in all that they do.

They're tossed around. They sort of want God but they don't want his wisdom and they turn to the world's wisdom and their own desires and they're just tossed around. Unstable in everything they do. They may be nice one moment. They're angry the next.

And then they even turn to blaming God. Look at verse 13. When tempted, no one should say, God is tempting me, for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone. So you hear these people. Do you see what they're saying as they walk into the day or they walk into the situation?

Well, God made me this way. I can't help falling into this particular sin. I'm not sure if it is even sin anyway. You call it sin. God says it's sin but I'm not sure if it is sin.

I'm not sure if I agree with him. God made me this way. I can live with my desire. God's fault. If I'm this, it's because of him.

Haven't you heard that? Haven't you heard that stuff? God can't be angry at me because this is the way I'm made. Or this trial is too much for me to bear. God is tempting me.

Who does he think he is? Now this person that responds to trials with that unbelief, not listening, not walking in the wisdom of God is locked in that chain. And there's only one possible outcome, and that is death. Doesn't necessarily mean you're gonna physically die that day, but something in you will die. So which story are you following?

James is showing us two chains, two stories. Just have a look at this first slide. Can you put that up? This is how it is. You walk into the day.

Everything's gonna be a trial. There are all kinds of trials. And you guys that go down faith, when you walk into the day, you go trusting God. Faith just means trust. And when you trust God, you see that the situations you're in are just testing you and that's good news.

It's gonna help you persevere. Perseverance. And it leads to perfection, to maturity. But you face today the same things and you don't listen to the word of God and you follow your evil desires, you follow your own heart, and that leads to temptation, and that leads to sin, and that leads to death. And to be honest, you could put whatever trial you like through that grid, couldn't you?

You're attracted to another man's wife. Put it through that grid. Where are you gonna go? You're same sex attracted. Put it through that grid.

Which way are you gonna go? The trial comes to you. You see something. You're attracted. Your desire is calling you.

Well, are you gonna go with the evil desire or are you going to go with god? You see, this is quite simple, isn't it? Every day. Every day. With all those trials.

Just have a look at this quote. I think it's brilliant. I found this in a commentary. Can I just read it out? Really have a listen to this because I think it's fantastic.

In in the very midst of a trial when I'm feeling fear and sorrow and pain, if I'm asked by a friend, what danger or threat is there in your life now that I may pray for you? I would probably answer, pray for the deadly disease to be healed or for my for my financial needs to be met or for people to stop doing the things that are injuring me. In other words, I would think that the chief injury being afflict inflicted by that trial. And my foremost concern would be for the trial to be stopped. Isn't that how we mostly pray for people?

He says now, in James chapter one verses 13 to 18 comes a word of God that requires a radical change in our thinking. The Bible says that the trial itself is not the most seriously life threatening factor. The greatest danger to me is not the wrong being done to me, but the wrong that I may that that may be done by me. The real threat is that when wrong is done to me, I may be tempted to fall into sin myself. Isn't that right?

How often we pray when someone's going to hospital for operation? Oh lord, you know, help the surgeon, may he cut the right leg off, may he pull the right liver out as anyone, you know. And there's nothing wrong with praying that, please don't get me wrong. But it's better to say that in that difficult, painful situation, may he or she know the love of God and understand that what they're going through is to help them mature in Christ. You see it?

Are we going to listen to God, therefore joyfully consider? Are we going to listen to our own desires? The greatest danger in a trial is always that we may be drawn away from the way, the truth, and the life into a wrong story into a wrong story. Just on your table before I get to the next point, just have a think about that. You can discuss with people about that.

Just have a a few few minutes, only a few minutes, just thinking about those things so far. So just have a discussion. Just be a a couple of minutes. If you're listening online, we're only be a couple of minutes. Now, in case you haven't got what I think James is trying to say or what I'm trying to say, James is brilliant because he illustrates it.

He's now gonna give us an illustration about these two stories and make it quite clear to us what he's really on about. And he's gonna ask us what story do we tell when it comes to things like money, being poor and insignificant as a person in this world or being rich and being someone that's known. He's gonna ask what story do you tell when you face those? And he sees them as trials. So he's gonna take us into the trial and the temptation of being poor or rich.

And he's gonna ask what story what story are you telling? So here's my second point then. Rich or poor, take the test. Let's take the test. Now, when you think of trials and difficulties and tests, I know what comes to mind.

It's things like health, always that. Relationships, you know, the difficulties there. Work, you know, that's a pain in the neck, is it? Pain, that's another one. Persecution, if you're a Christian that's being persecuted, particularly if you're in a land where, there's persecution going on.

And then obviously poverty, when you're feeling, you know, poor. But James adds riches. Being rich is a trial. Now, however rich you are comparatively to people in this room, we live in the richest part of the world. We are rich.

Always remember that when you read that in the Bible. You have water in your house, you're rich. Even Thames water, which is amazing, we get water. We're rich. You probably have hot water in your house.

We are rich. We are rich. And so we need to remember that. So how are you going to cope with riches and poverty or with someone who's richer than you? How are we going to cope?

That's what he's dealing with. So he's gonna he's gonna sort of help us with this story idea, I think. And I think it's a surprise to us that something like riches could be a trial. But look at verses nine to 12. Let me just read it again.

Believers in humble circumstances ought to take pride in their high position, but the rich should take pride in their humiliation. He's talking about riches being humiliating, since they will pass away like wild flowers for the sun rises with scorching heat and withers the plant. Its bloom falls and its beauty is destroyed in the same way the rich will fade away even while they go about their business. Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him. Riches are a trial.

So when it comes to the world's riches, what is your story? Whether you consider yourself rich or poor, at least, you know, comparatively with the people that we live among, what is the story you tell yourself? Will you listen? Remember we saw those two stories. To the world's wisdom or your heart's wisdom, will you listen to God's wisdom.

Which story which story are going to walk into? Well, let's take the trial of being poor first. You wake up and you go into your eighty six thousand four hundred seconds poor. Think about the difference here. Think about the difference between me saying, I am poor, and saying, I am experiencing poverty.

Sound the same, but they're big difference. I am poor or I am experiencing poverty. One is my identity, and the other describes my circumstances. You see it? I am poor.

That's what I am. And I'm describing am I be I'm telling the story about myself. I'm becoming my identity, which is I am poor. I am poor. Poor me.

I am experiencing poverty as my circumstances. That can be true. You see the difference? See the story that we can tell ourselves? I'm poor.

Poor me. This is what I am. This is my story. This is my stong stating my porness all the day long. Hello.

I'm poor. I'm a victim. What happens if your identity or you identify yourself like that? Well, it can lead to justifying you being an ungenerous person. I can't be generous because I'm poor.

Someone else should be generous. You see that? Or being kind to someone. I'm not gonna be kind to someone. Not to him.

He's full of riches. He should be kind to me. He becomes my identity. Or you can start making excuses about stealing. You know?

Look. I'm only taking from the rich. I'm not a Robin Hood. I take from the rich and give to the poor, and that happens to be me. Do you know?

And you may not go and steal from a shop with a mask on, but, you know, the way you deal with things, you steal all kinds of things, can't you? Just take them because you deserve it. Why? Because you're poor. Because that's your identity.

It may produce an if only dream world, you know? If only I'm rich. It could be you. It could be me. It could be me.

And you dream of unrealistic things, and you spend even your poverty on hoping that you'll win the lottery because it could be me. And if only I was rich, then I could be a nicer person, then I could entertain people, then I could be generous, if only. You live in an if only world because you've identified yourself as the poor. It may mean that you're lazy because you think, well, there's no point in working hard because I only get, you know, minimum wage, So what's the point of working hard? Or it may be the other way.

You work too much. It may be that you borrow money too much in order to get stuff that rich people get. So it makes you even more in debt. You see what happens if you identify yourself as I am poor. It means perhaps that you become dependent on rich people, and you don't mind that.

You hang about the rich, and you always want charity. That's what happens, isn't it? Did you see what I'm saying here? I hope you see what I'm saying. I think this is what what James is saying.

It's worth asking ourselves how double minded we are. He talks about being double minded. Cause we can say that money doesn't matter until money matters. And we can say that we have security in God until the bank balance begins to frighten us. Or we desire something that someone else has got and we can't afford.

Then covetousness and jealousy comes in, doesn't it? Why can they have it? They're Christians. I'm Christian. Why don't they give me stuff?

We can say that we're, not interested, in what others have. They, you know, they they can have stuff, but then when we see their house, and we see the holidays that they go on so quickly, and we see their lifestyle, and, you know, we start comparing ourselves. We look at someone and we say, why haven't I got what they've got? You see how we start to see ourselves? Our circumstances, their circumstances are better than mine.

Their story is more success. And when you have this comparison mindset, it can turn enough into not enough without taking a a single thing away from you. It's amazing, isn't it? Do see do you see how do you see how it goes? I've sort of got enough, but I've got not enough like him, and suddenly, I'm just not simply experiencing poverty.

I'm identifying with a lack. I'm the one who doesn't get the break. I'm the one that's always struggling. Nothing ever works for me. Life is just difficult and the circumstances become the lens through which you see the world and it's the story you tell and you even blame God.

Why me? Why are they blessed? Why doesn't he answer my prayers? And that's the wisdom of the world set alight by an evil heart. Now, look, we're gonna go into the world.

We're in the world today. We're still running through some of our eighty six thousand four hundred seconds. Tomorrow, you're gonna wake up with, how's how are you gonna face this? That's the wisdom of the world. It's set alight in our heart.

But if I'm going to follow Christ, if I'm going to work through this trial and not turn it into that temptation, then I I need, if I'm gonna consider it pure joy, that I am in my circumstances, I need God's wisdom. I need God's help to do that. I need verse five, which simply says, if any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. I need to ask wisdom. The reason I asked for Psalm 73 to be read, it's a fantastic Psalm.

Because in the Psalm and I think I hope you saw it. The writer's sort of looking around, right? And he sees all these richer people and actually pretty nasty people, anti god people. He's trying to live a godly life and these people are doing really well in the world and he's having a rough time. Yeah?

And he's looking around and he's saying, where's god? What's going on here? And he always looks sideways. He always compares himself. They're doing better than me.

And then he admits that that nearly made him slip away. He his feet, he says, almost slipped into the abyss. He he lost his foothold because he's telling this story to himself. They're better than me. Look at them.

I'm a godly man. They're not godly. They're doing, you know, and then that trial of of rewriting that they are doing so well and coming from his perspective, well, it says in in, Psalm 73, just listen to him. He starts talking to himself. The story that he wants to live, which is a godly life.

He says, surely in vain, I have kept my heart pure. What's the point of it? And have washed my hands in innocence. All day long, I've been afflicted, and every morning brings new punishments. You see?

And then he describes what he became in verse twenty one and twenty two of Psalm 73. When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittened, look, I was senseless and ignorant and I was a brute beast before God. He's gone down his desires. He's told the story that they're doing better than him. He's told the story that success in the world is better than knowing god and he's told this story and he's turning into this brute beast.

You see what's going on there? Then, at the end of the Psalm, he comes to god the father. Verse 24, 28, he says, you guide me with your counsel and afterwards you will take me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire beside you.

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is my strength and my heart and my portion forever. Those who are far from you, they will perish. You destroy all those who are unfaithful to you. But as for me, there's a for me. There's a for me there.

As for me, yeah, as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge. I will tell of all your deeds. And James, back to James, does exactly the same thing. This is the right story to tell.

Look at verse nine. Believers in humble circumstances ought to take pride in their high position. Look at verse 12. Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised those who love him. Now the Greek word for humble circumstances literally means one who doesn't rise far above the ground.

See, Jesus and the Bible turns everything the other way up. The story of the Bible is, if you are in humble circumstances, you don't rise high up to the ground. You're not a great big celebrity. You're not famous. You haven't got all the glitz of money and the big house on the hill.

You're in the high position, he says. The one who doesn't rise up high is in the high position. Let the brother and sister who does not rise high above the ground take pride in their high position that they have reached. Because they can reach the wisdom of God. Because the wisdom of God comes down from heaven.

Because they've got a crown of life waiting for them. Their treasure is in heaven, not on earth. Don't be deceived by wealth. James is saying. Jesus, who is in fact the word of God, Jesus who is actually the wisdom of God, says in his sermon on the mount, therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life and what you eat or drink or about your body and what you will wear.

Is not life more than food and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air. They do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to his life?

When you walk into the world and you face this trial, tell the right story, the story of God. You are rich. You are wealthy. You are God's child. He is your heavenly father.

You have a crown of life coming to you. Tell the story. Those who are arrogant and rich, well, let's get on to them. Look at the trial of being rich, verses ten and eleven of James one. But the rich should take pride in their humiliation.

Since they will pass away like a wild flower for the sun rises and the scorching heat and withers the plant, its blossoms fall and its beauty will be destroyed, is destroyed, in the same way the rich will fade away, even while they go about their business. I am rich. This is my story. This is my song praising my riches all of day long. Hello.

I'm considerably richer than you. We build an identity about what we have, and we make our identity in our riches. If we identify ourselves as being rich, we will become arrogant, we will make excuses and about being rude to the unsuccessful. If we identify ourselves as being rich, see how you can see how you can dump your sin on God. Well, God's blessed me with riches.

I I was looking at this awful awful preacher on the on the online. What's his name? I can't remember. Jesse DiPlanto or something. And every clip I ever get from him, I don't know whether someone's doing this for a laugh or something, but every here here he is.

He's walking up and down. And he says, I have the biggest house of any preacher in America. Well, sell it, you idiot. I have the bit and then he was going on about his watch. Do you know how much this watch is worth?

$60,000. I think it was more, actually. I have the biggest house in the whole of America. Do you know what staircase is in my house? The one that was in the film Gone With The Wind or whatever.

Yes. That's in my house. I have that. Well, repent and give it away. I have three jets.

What's he saying? He's saying he's better than everyone. He's more blessed than everyone. God's blessed him. God has blessed me.

That's what he's saying. And so he's blaming God for his sin. You see that? It's a way of blaming God for his sin. God's fault, he blessed me.

Massive trial in our world. A massive trial. We need to see that all of the things that you have in this world, all the beauty. I was I was reading I did a little bit research. Jewish, I saw what I doing and wondered what I was on about, why was I looking at these pictures on my on my on my computer.

I was looking up Hollywood dresses that women in Hollywood wear. And $7,000,000 for a dress for one evening. $7,000,000. Right? I mean, you could buy all the clothes for a million people from Tesco for that, for the rest of their life, couldn't you?

You went to chew or whatever it's called. If you went to Primark, what's it called? Sainsbury's whatever. You could upgrade to Sainsbury's. It's extra $7,000,000.

They're glitzy. They're beautiful. They got the figure, and you look at them, and they stand above the ground, don't they? And they look down on people that are poor. The temptation to be standing out like that is massive.

God's wisdom reverses all that. If we're going into this world, the trial of riches, we need God's help. We need to say verse five, if you, if anyone lacks wisdom, you should ask God who gives generously to all without finding fault and it will be given to you. We need to hear what Jesus, the word, the wisdom of God says, watch out, be on your guard against all kinds of greed. Life does not consist in abundance of your possessions.

And then he tells a story about a man who gets richer and richer and I guess his wife wears a 7,000,000 dress and he's got the biggest house in in Israel at the time and Jesus says that he will die and God will say, you fool, this very night your life will be demanded of you, then who will get what you have prepared for yourself? This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich towards God. Jesus said, do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rats destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but store up for yourselves treasure in heaven where moths and rats do not destroy. And James says the same thing, we see it in verse 10. Only the rich believer who boasts in their lowly position.

They are in a low position because they've got riches. Only the believer that sees the fleeting character of wealth will be able to hand handle the challenge of this test and not allow it them to fall into temptation. I'm finished nearly. I've got one more point. What is your story?

What is your story? What's your story going to be? Are you going to call yourself something? Have you noticed what people do? I am a.

I am a. They make the story up, don't they? This is what I am. I am I've got my mobile phone that makes noise at the back. I am a I have What's your story?

Will you live in the truth and go to your father and ask for help that you may work out his story? Don't make the trial your identity. Identity. Don't make your poverty your identity. Don't make your success your identity.

Don't make your suffering your identity. Don't make anything your identity except that you have a father in heaven, and you are rich with him. I belong to the father. This is my story. This is my song.

Praising my savior. I'm saved all the day long. That's my story. That's the story I'm gonna tell when I go into the world. Go to God the father.

Ask him for wisdom. Don't just go with your desires. I was listening to this whole stuff about Claude and Andronica and AI is gonna take the world away or whatever it is. All that stuff to scare us and nonsense. But what I was listening is with what Claude has done apparently, and I'm only telling you what I heard.

I'm sure someone will come up and say, but listen, they've why it's scary, but they're saying is, with the AI of or andronica is that they've put in a system that says protect yourself. And so the AI is working to protect itself. So if someone comes along and says, I'm gonna shut this down. It's saying, no, you're not. And I don't like you.

And that's the scary thing. It will do if you know the film 2,001 Space Holiday, it will do what Hal did to David. David, if you've ever seen it, it's a fantastic film. David, I'm not going to let you do that, David. I'm going to open the hatch in space, David.

You know, so that's the scary thing. But you see what that is? It's written in a story in it to protect itself. So the the danger is destruction to everybody else and death to everybody else because it wants to protect itself and it will use all its ability to protect itself. That's that's what they're saying the problem is.

Is that you? Is your name Claude? Are you Claude? You wake up in the day and you're just going to protect yourself. That's the wrong story.

That's the wrong story. Your makeup story is about everybody around you and how bad they are. That's the wrong story. This is my story. This is my song.

Praising my savior all the day long. God is my father. Let's pray. As we have a moment to quiet and pray, be good to think really practically about that in our own lives, wouldn't it? To try to think of an area of your life whether that be a relationship or a work thing or a disappointment that you're facing.

Some area where you need to start telling yourself a different story of faith. Not of desires, but of faith. Think of it for you, an area where you just need to start reframing the story a bit in your own mind in light of what we've been hearing. Generous father, we pray that you would give us the wisdom that we desperately need so that we can tell ourselves stories that are true and good for us. And so that we can know joy even in difficulties.

And so that we can bring glory to you and know the peace of God because we're listening to the right stories. And we pray this in Jesus name. Amen.