Study of James: Coming Close to God
Sunday, March 01, 2020
Peace to Live By Study of James: Coming Close to God - Daniel Litton
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[Transcript may not match broadcasted sermon word for word. Sections in bold are extra material that was cut from the broadcast due to time constraints]
We are continuing along in James chapter 4. Today we are arriving at a famous verse, one that we’ve heard quite a bit. And that’s where we’re going to start.
James chapter 4, verse 7 states, “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”
We have two parts to verse 7 here, and much to talk about. So, let’s focus on the first sentence here. What, really, in reality, does it mean to “Submit.” I mean, I think this is pretty important. For one thing, we don’t want to get a wrong impression. And of course, the impression we get will be dependent upon our current level of Inner-Self. The more negative we are, the more negative we are going to view God. It’s just the way it is, unfortunately. And really, there’s more to it because the amount of positively that flows inside our minds has a direct impact on our world around us. Just think about it. The more negative a person is, the more negative their life is going to be. They are going to be making incorrect actions for themselves, and treating people incorrectly. So, the more positive a person is, the better the life experience, and the more others want to around that person. This is the way the God of the Universe has set things in order.
Anyway, to submit to God—what does the word submit mean? Well, let’s look at some others words that can help us clarify what submit means. To submit means to agree, surrender, abide, indulge, obey, relinquish, and to yield. Basically, we are submitting to God when we are in agreement with him. It’s that simple. There’s nothing hard here. There’s nothing to be afraid of. People who live outside of relationship with God obviously aren’t in agreement with him. And a couple reasons exist as to why it is to our personal benefit to agree with God. Number one, we want to agree with him because we want to have nothing between us and him. Number two, we want to agree with him as his way of living life produces the most happiness and satisfaction for us. Since God created the universe, the world, and us, then it would make sense for us to live how he wants us to live. His ways are the ways that lead us to life. There may not be instant gratification, but really that shouldn’t even be our goal in the first place.
What are we not submitting to, then? We aren’t submitting to man made rules, rules that people at our church or within our community of believers say we need to follow to be pleasing to God. We aren’t submitting to external rules we have made for ourselves, like that we have to read five chapters of the Bible everyday or pray for twenty minutes everyday for God to be happy. We aren’t mind reading God. What mind reading means is assuming we know what God thinks and what God wants from us throughout the day. We don’t live by notions where we think, “Well, I think God wants me to do this or that. I think God wants me to pray for twenty minutes everyday.” That’s you, not God. As I’ve been talking about with the Law of Liberty (one of the methods for this study), we are free to worship and serve God how we please. If we want to spend twenty minutes with him in prayer everyday, we will. If not, that’s our choice. It becomes a problem for us when we give ourselves a guilt trip over not following rules we have created in our minds and of which are not from God.
What about the other thing James said? What is resisting the devil? If we are to resist the devil, that must mean he has some pretty enticing plans. He is wanting us to do things which are outside of God’s will, to work in ways that, one, won’t work, and two, will hurt us in the long run. The devil wants us to be unforgiving. The devil wants us to be sexually immoral, do drugs, drink too much alcohol, have friends we shouldn’t have, cheat on schoolwork, cheat on our taxes, cheat on our spouse, not give our children the time and gifts that we should, indeed, whatever you want to place here that is wrong—whatever doesn’t really help us in the long run. The devil’s way is the shortcut. It is the way that gets us that instant gratification. It’s the reward his way brings us. It’s just that this reward is for the moment, and once the moment has passed, there is no more reward but rather disappointment. There is disappointment because we are left feeling we didn’t do things right. We are felt feeling that we should have taken another approach. We have to see the others who did in fact do what we should have done and are now prosperous as a result.
So, we are to resist the devil. What does the word “Resist” really mean? We could say resist is to confront, defy, forgo, refuse, repel, turn down, and stand up to. The point is that we are not just caving in to what Satan says to us. We are not simply following his ways without thinking about what the consequences might be. We are smarter than that. When we are are really resisting, we know that his ways won’t work for us. We have knowledge. We have studied the Word of God and know how God says to live. Having become familiar with what God says, we are able to live in a way that is pleasing to him.
This resisting, however, is not burdensome. It’s not really a struggle for us. It’s only a struggle if we are making it hard for ourselves. What I mean is that resisting is really surrendering. It’s really all in the Giving Up Control method I have been discussing. The issue for us comes when we get all afraid of what the devil may be doing. One a smaller scale, when we get afraid of a thought he presents to us, we immediately suppress that thought out of our awareness. The problem with this is that the thought is going to have to come back up later in time because instead of dealing with it, we became afraid of it and pushed it down within ourselves. On a grander scale, if we immediately become anxious about a particular life-situation this will work certainly only to cause us to self-sabotage. This is because as we have become afraid of the situation, we have immediately handicapped ourselves mentally, and making the right choice from this point forward is going to be difficult, and may not even happen as we have blinded ourselves by our fear.
James says the devil will flee from us when we resist him. That certainly makes sense, doesn’t it? If we don’t immediately go into a fear state, with whatever it is, then then quickly he loses his power. How can Satan have power over us if we aren’t afraid of him? Remember Jesus told us to not be afraid of humans with evil plans. Well, so it is with Satan himself. Satan has so much victory and power over people because they immediately become afraid of him. They become afraid of a bad thought. They quiver over some seemingly bad luck that has been presented to them. All people have negative situations come up in life. And yet, all people do not respond the same. There are people of whom nothing really ever seems to bother them, or if it does bother them, it is only for a short period of time. But this power over the enemy is available to anyone. Those who suffer just don’t think they can be like these ‘positive’ people. Really, though, anyone has power within themselves to respond correctly. Isn’t that right? Why would James tell us to “Resist” if it wasn’t in our capacity to resist?
Once we have learned to resist, we can follow the next part of James’ passage here: “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.” (James 4:8-9, ESV)
If we haven’t resisted Satan, we can’t draw near to God. It’s just a statement of fact. This can be in one particular life situation, or it can be that we have a bad habit in general of not resisting Satan. In this latter case, indeed, we have a lot of problems because we haven’t followed God’s truth in our lives. There has to be that cleaning, that purification, that recognition of what sin is, and really what it is not, so that we can then, in turn, draw near to God. Double-mindedness is a serious problem for us. We are are double-minded in that, on the one hand, we desire to do what God wants us to do, and then, on the other hand, we desire to live in a way that isn’t God approved. Yes, we are in serious trouble in this case. We cannot be close to God. And, we are in the process of becoming less like we really want to be. We are moving less and less toward the character we really want to exemplify. We are in the process of unbecoming.
It is my belief, unquestionably so, that one has be “Be wretched and mourn and weep” in recognition of the ways one identifies in his or her life that are not moving them toward God. This is an important and necessary process. There has to be an identification where, and really this is the whole point of our study here in the Book of James, there has to be that identification of ways in which we are living, conducting our lives, that are really hurting us. The negative person, for instance, must realize he or she is negative in the first place before he or she can do anything about their negativity. Common sense, right? The person living with their boyfriend or girlfriend right now outside of marriage, but in the same breath realizes they want to become closer to God and more pleasing to him, has to go through the hard process of realizing that what they are doing right now isn’t working for them. It’s not God best, and it won’t work victory in the long run. The good times, the laughter has to be turned to bad times of reflection, bad times of mourning. The joyful times in the past must become gloomy before they can become better.
It is then, and only really then, that we can move close to God. When we can actually move close to God, James tells us that God will move close to us. What a tremendous thing. What an awesome thing. It is always great when you meet a brother or sister who has just gone through this process. They have left a life behind that wasn’t working for them—one that only brought them death at the end of day. And they have made the transition out of their situation and into a more holy life in which now they feel they can in fact draw near to God. And they are liberated, they are happy. They have a new life. Things are moving in right direction. They feel good; we feel good. We are blessed by their new way of living, their new life. We are excited to be a part of it.
I knew a girl once who was the happiest I think she’d ever been when she decided to put her life back on track. She’d was graduated from college now, but back at college, she’d been living with her boyfriend for some time and was living the party life. She told me how it went. She said when she first went to college, that everything was fine the first year or so. But then some of her friends got her to go to a party one night, and things started to go down hill from there. One party turned to two. And you know the rest of the story. She met a guy and she ended up living with him. This girl had entered college a born-again Christian, but by the time graduation was coming around, she’d gone the total opposite direction. But she realized the error of her ways and was able to put her life back on track. She got rid of the boyfriend, came back home, and began a new life. She was on fire for God. She was able to draw close to him.
Next James tells us, “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.” (4:10, ESV)
Yes, this is what has to take place—lowering oneself to that humble spirit—if we are going to change from moving in the wrong direction to moving in the right direction. What does it mean to humble ourselves? We could say that to make ourselves humble means to quiet our rebellion, to become respectful of God, to stop being bold in our own ways, to unfriend the world around us—the world’s ways. It is only in this way that we can truly become the person that God wants us to be. By humility, we can move up the Inner-Self scale, to move from the lowest state to the next state all the way to the Positive Existence. Humility has to occur if we want to receive the words God has to say to us. It is only when we are honest with ourselves that forward progress can be made. It is only then that God says, he himself says, he will exalt us. And why is this? Following God’s ways naturally exalts us because they are the correct ways, the most fruit ways. We will naturally become successful at whatever change we are making because we are becoming pleasing to God.
James is now changing directions here a little bit. He says, “Do not speak evil against one another, brothers and sisters. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?” (James 4:11-12, ESV)
The first thing that comes to my mind when I read this passage is encouragement. We all need encouragement. That last thing we need is someone, especially a follow believer in Jesus, trying to discourage us by speaking negatively. Yes, negative speaking can be a serious problem for some. Hopefully we’re not that person who continues to speak negatively about this and that, whatever it might be. Some people I notice seem to speak negatively about everything, no matter what the subject matter is. We don’t want to be like this, though, if we are going to have a positive life and if we are doing to live within the Third Level of Inner-Self, the Positive Existence.
When we have a conflict, a disagreement, or whatever it is, with a brother or a sister, there is only one way for it really to end, one way that is pleasing to God. And you know what that one way is. You guessed it. It’s going to have to end in a peaceful resolution. That’s the only way both parties at the end of the day are going to end up happy. It’s the only way that really works for us. Staying continually in disagreement with someone, holding a grudge, or making the person pay for the wrong they did isn’t going to give us freedom. Usually, it ends up hurting us more than it does the other person. Judging our fellow brother or sister for a wrong done, and refusing even to forgive, only keeps the problem alive. It only makes it so that situation is still outstanding; it hasn’t been resolved.
If we have been a Christian for any short length of time we should know the importance of forgiveness. Why, the Lord Jesus Christ has forgiven us all our sins, so shouldn’t we freely forgive others the wrongs they do against us? Sounds good, doesn’t it? It certainly sounds easy. But is it easy? I think sometimes it is. However, we all know that there are some instances when someone has offended us greatly, and all our minds want to do are send signals to the mouth to speak negatively against the person, to tell others the great wrong that was done against us, and how we are a poor, innocent victim. And sometimes, in fact, we are a poor, innocent victim. Sometimes we aren’t. This is besides the point, however. Jesus wants us to forgive all people all their offenses, even the big ones, as tuff of a pill as that may be swallow.
We can hold a grudge; for sure we can do that. What does that look like for us? When we hold a grudge, the problem continues to swirl around in our minds, day after day, week after week, month after month. This leads to year after year in some cases. The problem isn’t resolved. It’s a wound that won’t heal. We look down at our arm, and it’s always there. The thing won’t heal up, and it’s bothering us from time to time. It gets really annoying. What we find, over time, is that it simply isn’t worth it. It’s not worth harboring all the animosity in our minds even if we really were wronged. We should examine ourselves to try to see what is really true because sometimes we did wrong too. Nevertheless, it’s like Paul told the Corinthians, that it would be better to just be wronged than to take wrath out against a person, or probably more prevalent, to continue to take wrath out against them in our minds.
If we take a close look at others around us, we will notice that some have decided to forgive certain offenses, and it has worked tremendously well for them. That’s the truth of the matter. We don’t have to respond like we have in the past. We have the option of choosing a different pattern, trying something new, since we know that what we have done in the past hasn’t worked. It’s, again, only worked to make us miserable. But by choosing a new way of forgiveness, we see ourselves heal, and perhaps may even see a healed relationship.
A couple of complications occur when we judge others. The first is that in judging others, we often find ourselves guilty of doing the same thing or something similar or comparable. The second is that in judging others, we are not utilizing the concept of mercy. The truth is, often people who have done us wrong didn’t really mean to. They weren’t trying to offend us, or do something that has caused us anxiety. It’s unfortunately just the way things went. When we realize this truth, it makes it easier to forgive both ourselves and others for issues that arise. We can have mercy because we understand that at times, we have offended others and weren’t intending to. Sometimes that just the way it goes no matter how careful we try to present ourselves.
A big hurtle with forgiveness given to others is that it means we have to relinquish our pride. There certainly is a feeling of satisfaction and comfort when we feel we’ve been wrong, when we feel we were the victim of whatever offense it was. Self-pity feels pretty good, and that’s why really it’s a temptation for us. It is tempting to just wallow in self-pity and never really deal with the issue at hand. Besides, it makes us feel completely guilt-free, as if we aren’t guilty of anything in relation to whatever it was.
The reality is, when we find ourselves moving up the scale of consciousness, we find that it becomes more and more natural to be merciful toward others, rather than judging and speaking negatively against them. This is because everything is connected in our minds to everything else. It’s like the river that I talked about at the beginning of our study. The river is flowing, and we can either flow in the right direction and feel good, or we can continue to flow in the wrong direction and have resistance after resistance. In cleaning up one area of our minds, it automatically allows for other parts to get better.
When we are negative and critical toward a fellow brother or sister we can end up making God look bad. We are not supposed to be thinking the worst of our fellow Christians, assuming they must be up to no good because all people inherently have the sin nature. You see, often times when we have judged another in the past, we have found ourselves to be wrong. The problem is, when we have spoken negatively against the person, other people know about that. This creates a lot of problems. One, it shows that the accuser really isn’t as in tune with God or in tune with the behavior around him or her as much as he or she thought they were. Two, it shows that the accuser really doesn’t practice the Word of God because he or she is supposed to believe the best about everyone, as the Apostle Paul makes clear. Three, it hurts the image of the accused so that now the person has to overcome the artificial (or rather false) presentation that has been made about them.
The great thing is, is that God is able to save those who are faithful to him, and he works to accomplish that. So, no matter what the situation, whether there has been a relationship that has gone into the frying pan, or whether someone has accused someone of doing something, God is able to guide the thoughts of people so that they make the right choices. The only thing is, is that people have to choose to be obedient to the Scripture and do what is right, rather than holding onto self-righteousness and continuing to choose the wrong. In the latter case, the person cannot grow, and likely will go through a similar situation in the future because their poor actions, whether consciously or subconsciously, will cause the past to repeat itself.
- Daniel Litton
Today’s Acknowledgements:
Psychologists David R. Hawkins and David D. Burns
We are continuing along in James chapter 4. Today we are arriving at a famous verse, one that we’ve heard quite a bit. And that’s where we’re going to start.
James chapter 4, verse 7 states, “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”
We have two parts to verse 7 here, and much to talk about. So, let’s focus on the first sentence here. What, really, in reality, does it mean to “Submit.” I mean, I think this is pretty important. For one thing, we don’t want to get a wrong impression. And of course, the impression we get will be dependent upon our current level of Inner-Self. The more negative we are, the more negative we are going to view God. It’s just the way it is, unfortunately. And really, there’s more to it because the amount of positively that flows inside our minds has a direct impact on our world around us. Just think about it. The more negative a person is, the more negative their life is going to be. They are going to be making incorrect actions for themselves, and treating people incorrectly. So, the more positive a person is, the better the life experience, and the more others want to around that person. This is the way the God of the Universe has set things in order.
Anyway, to submit to God—what does the word submit mean? Well, let’s look at some others words that can help us clarify what submit means. To submit means to agree, surrender, abide, indulge, obey, relinquish, and to yield. Basically, we are submitting to God when we are in agreement with him. It’s that simple. There’s nothing hard here. There’s nothing to be afraid of. People who live outside of relationship with God obviously aren’t in agreement with him. And a couple reasons exist as to why it is to our personal benefit to agree with God. Number one, we want to agree with him because we want to have nothing between us and him. Number two, we want to agree with him as his way of living life produces the most happiness and satisfaction for us. Since God created the universe, the world, and us, then it would make sense for us to live how he wants us to live. His ways are the ways that lead us to life. There may not be instant gratification, but really that shouldn’t even be our goal in the first place.
What are we not submitting to, then? We aren’t submitting to man made rules, rules that people at our church or within our community of believers say we need to follow to be pleasing to God. We aren’t submitting to external rules we have made for ourselves, like that we have to read five chapters of the Bible everyday or pray for twenty minutes everyday for God to be happy. We aren’t mind reading God. What mind reading means is assuming we know what God thinks and what God wants from us throughout the day. We don’t live by notions where we think, “Well, I think God wants me to do this or that. I think God wants me to pray for twenty minutes everyday.” That’s you, not God. As I’ve been talking about with the Law of Liberty (one of the methods for this study), we are free to worship and serve God how we please. If we want to spend twenty minutes with him in prayer everyday, we will. If not, that’s our choice. It becomes a problem for us when we give ourselves a guilt trip over not following rules we have created in our minds and of which are not from God.
What about the other thing James said? What is resisting the devil? If we are to resist the devil, that must mean he has some pretty enticing plans. He is wanting us to do things which are outside of God’s will, to work in ways that, one, won’t work, and two, will hurt us in the long run. The devil wants us to be unforgiving. The devil wants us to be sexually immoral, do drugs, drink too much alcohol, have friends we shouldn’t have, cheat on schoolwork, cheat on our taxes, cheat on our spouse, not give our children the time and gifts that we should, indeed, whatever you want to place here that is wrong—whatever doesn’t really help us in the long run. The devil’s way is the shortcut. It is the way that gets us that instant gratification. It’s the reward his way brings us. It’s just that this reward is for the moment, and once the moment has passed, there is no more reward but rather disappointment. There is disappointment because we are left feeling we didn’t do things right. We are felt feeling that we should have taken another approach. We have to see the others who did in fact do what we should have done and are now prosperous as a result.
So, we are to resist the devil. What does the word “Resist” really mean? We could say resist is to confront, defy, forgo, refuse, repel, turn down, and stand up to. The point is that we are not just caving in to what Satan says to us. We are not simply following his ways without thinking about what the consequences might be. We are smarter than that. When we are are really resisting, we know that his ways won’t work for us. We have knowledge. We have studied the Word of God and know how God says to live. Having become familiar with what God says, we are able to live in a way that is pleasing to him.
This resisting, however, is not burdensome. It’s not really a struggle for us. It’s only a struggle if we are making it hard for ourselves. What I mean is that resisting is really surrendering. It’s really all in the Giving Up Control method I have been discussing. The issue for us comes when we get all afraid of what the devil may be doing. One a smaller scale, when we get afraid of a thought he presents to us, we immediately suppress that thought out of our awareness. The problem with this is that the thought is going to have to come back up later in time because instead of dealing with it, we became afraid of it and pushed it down within ourselves. On a grander scale, if we immediately become anxious about a particular life-situation this will work certainly only to cause us to self-sabotage. This is because as we have become afraid of the situation, we have immediately handicapped ourselves mentally, and making the right choice from this point forward is going to be difficult, and may not even happen as we have blinded ourselves by our fear.
James says the devil will flee from us when we resist him. That certainly makes sense, doesn’t it? If we don’t immediately go into a fear state, with whatever it is, then then quickly he loses his power. How can Satan have power over us if we aren’t afraid of him? Remember Jesus told us to not be afraid of humans with evil plans. Well, so it is with Satan himself. Satan has so much victory and power over people because they immediately become afraid of him. They become afraid of a bad thought. They quiver over some seemingly bad luck that has been presented to them. All people have negative situations come up in life. And yet, all people do not respond the same. There are people of whom nothing really ever seems to bother them, or if it does bother them, it is only for a short period of time. But this power over the enemy is available to anyone. Those who suffer just don’t think they can be like these ‘positive’ people. Really, though, anyone has power within themselves to respond correctly. Isn’t that right? Why would James tell us to “Resist” if it wasn’t in our capacity to resist?
Once we have learned to resist, we can follow the next part of James’ passage here: “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.” (James 4:8-9, ESV)
If we haven’t resisted Satan, we can’t draw near to God. It’s just a statement of fact. This can be in one particular life situation, or it can be that we have a bad habit in general of not resisting Satan. In this latter case, indeed, we have a lot of problems because we haven’t followed God’s truth in our lives. There has to be that cleaning, that purification, that recognition of what sin is, and really what it is not, so that we can then, in turn, draw near to God. Double-mindedness is a serious problem for us. We are are double-minded in that, on the one hand, we desire to do what God wants us to do, and then, on the other hand, we desire to live in a way that isn’t God approved. Yes, we are in serious trouble in this case. We cannot be close to God. And, we are in the process of becoming less like we really want to be. We are moving less and less toward the character we really want to exemplify. We are in the process of unbecoming.
It is my belief, unquestionably so, that one has be “Be wretched and mourn and weep” in recognition of the ways one identifies in his or her life that are not moving them toward God. This is an important and necessary process. There has to be an identification where, and really this is the whole point of our study here in the Book of James, there has to be that identification of ways in which we are living, conducting our lives, that are really hurting us. The negative person, for instance, must realize he or she is negative in the first place before he or she can do anything about their negativity. Common sense, right? The person living with their boyfriend or girlfriend right now outside of marriage, but in the same breath realizes they want to become closer to God and more pleasing to him, has to go through the hard process of realizing that what they are doing right now isn’t working for them. It’s not God best, and it won’t work victory in the long run. The good times, the laughter has to be turned to bad times of reflection, bad times of mourning. The joyful times in the past must become gloomy before they can become better.
It is then, and only really then, that we can move close to God. When we can actually move close to God, James tells us that God will move close to us. What a tremendous thing. What an awesome thing. It is always great when you meet a brother or sister who has just gone through this process. They have left a life behind that wasn’t working for them—one that only brought them death at the end of day. And they have made the transition out of their situation and into a more holy life in which now they feel they can in fact draw near to God. And they are liberated, they are happy. They have a new life. Things are moving in right direction. They feel good; we feel good. We are blessed by their new way of living, their new life. We are excited to be a part of it.
I knew a girl once who was the happiest I think she’d ever been when she decided to put her life back on track. She’d was graduated from college now, but back at college, she’d been living with her boyfriend for some time and was living the party life. She told me how it went. She said when she first went to college, that everything was fine the first year or so. But then some of her friends got her to go to a party one night, and things started to go down hill from there. One party turned to two. And you know the rest of the story. She met a guy and she ended up living with him. This girl had entered college a born-again Christian, but by the time graduation was coming around, she’d gone the total opposite direction. But she realized the error of her ways and was able to put her life back on track. She got rid of the boyfriend, came back home, and began a new life. She was on fire for God. She was able to draw close to him.
Next James tells us, “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.” (4:10, ESV)
Yes, this is what has to take place—lowering oneself to that humble spirit—if we are going to change from moving in the wrong direction to moving in the right direction. What does it mean to humble ourselves? We could say that to make ourselves humble means to quiet our rebellion, to become respectful of God, to stop being bold in our own ways, to unfriend the world around us—the world’s ways. It is only in this way that we can truly become the person that God wants us to be. By humility, we can move up the Inner-Self scale, to move from the lowest state to the next state all the way to the Positive Existence. Humility has to occur if we want to receive the words God has to say to us. It is only when we are honest with ourselves that forward progress can be made. It is only then that God says, he himself says, he will exalt us. And why is this? Following God’s ways naturally exalts us because they are the correct ways, the most fruit ways. We will naturally become successful at whatever change we are making because we are becoming pleasing to God.
James is now changing directions here a little bit. He says, “Do not speak evil against one another, brothers and sisters. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?” (James 4:11-12, ESV)
The first thing that comes to my mind when I read this passage is encouragement. We all need encouragement. That last thing we need is someone, especially a follow believer in Jesus, trying to discourage us by speaking negatively. Yes, negative speaking can be a serious problem for some. Hopefully we’re not that person who continues to speak negatively about this and that, whatever it might be. Some people I notice seem to speak negatively about everything, no matter what the subject matter is. We don’t want to be like this, though, if we are going to have a positive life and if we are doing to live within the Third Level of Inner-Self, the Positive Existence.
When we have a conflict, a disagreement, or whatever it is, with a brother or a sister, there is only one way for it really to end, one way that is pleasing to God. And you know what that one way is. You guessed it. It’s going to have to end in a peaceful resolution. That’s the only way both parties at the end of the day are going to end up happy. It’s the only way that really works for us. Staying continually in disagreement with someone, holding a grudge, or making the person pay for the wrong they did isn’t going to give us freedom. Usually, it ends up hurting us more than it does the other person. Judging our fellow brother or sister for a wrong done, and refusing even to forgive, only keeps the problem alive. It only makes it so that situation is still outstanding; it hasn’t been resolved.
If we have been a Christian for any short length of time we should know the importance of forgiveness. Why, the Lord Jesus Christ has forgiven us all our sins, so shouldn’t we freely forgive others the wrongs they do against us? Sounds good, doesn’t it? It certainly sounds easy. But is it easy? I think sometimes it is. However, we all know that there are some instances when someone has offended us greatly, and all our minds want to do are send signals to the mouth to speak negatively against the person, to tell others the great wrong that was done against us, and how we are a poor, innocent victim. And sometimes, in fact, we are a poor, innocent victim. Sometimes we aren’t. This is besides the point, however. Jesus wants us to forgive all people all their offenses, even the big ones, as tuff of a pill as that may be swallow.
We can hold a grudge; for sure we can do that. What does that look like for us? When we hold a grudge, the problem continues to swirl around in our minds, day after day, week after week, month after month. This leads to year after year in some cases. The problem isn’t resolved. It’s a wound that won’t heal. We look down at our arm, and it’s always there. The thing won’t heal up, and it’s bothering us from time to time. It gets really annoying. What we find, over time, is that it simply isn’t worth it. It’s not worth harboring all the animosity in our minds even if we really were wronged. We should examine ourselves to try to see what is really true because sometimes we did wrong too. Nevertheless, it’s like Paul told the Corinthians, that it would be better to just be wronged than to take wrath out against a person, or probably more prevalent, to continue to take wrath out against them in our minds.
If we take a close look at others around us, we will notice that some have decided to forgive certain offenses, and it has worked tremendously well for them. That’s the truth of the matter. We don’t have to respond like we have in the past. We have the option of choosing a different pattern, trying something new, since we know that what we have done in the past hasn’t worked. It’s, again, only worked to make us miserable. But by choosing a new way of forgiveness, we see ourselves heal, and perhaps may even see a healed relationship.
A couple of complications occur when we judge others. The first is that in judging others, we often find ourselves guilty of doing the same thing or something similar or comparable. The second is that in judging others, we are not utilizing the concept of mercy. The truth is, often people who have done us wrong didn’t really mean to. They weren’t trying to offend us, or do something that has caused us anxiety. It’s unfortunately just the way things went. When we realize this truth, it makes it easier to forgive both ourselves and others for issues that arise. We can have mercy because we understand that at times, we have offended others and weren’t intending to. Sometimes that just the way it goes no matter how careful we try to present ourselves.
A big hurtle with forgiveness given to others is that it means we have to relinquish our pride. There certainly is a feeling of satisfaction and comfort when we feel we’ve been wrong, when we feel we were the victim of whatever offense it was. Self-pity feels pretty good, and that’s why really it’s a temptation for us. It is tempting to just wallow in self-pity and never really deal with the issue at hand. Besides, it makes us feel completely guilt-free, as if we aren’t guilty of anything in relation to whatever it was.
The reality is, when we find ourselves moving up the scale of consciousness, we find that it becomes more and more natural to be merciful toward others, rather than judging and speaking negatively against them. This is because everything is connected in our minds to everything else. It’s like the river that I talked about at the beginning of our study. The river is flowing, and we can either flow in the right direction and feel good, or we can continue to flow in the wrong direction and have resistance after resistance. In cleaning up one area of our minds, it automatically allows for other parts to get better.
When we are negative and critical toward a fellow brother or sister we can end up making God look bad. We are not supposed to be thinking the worst of our fellow Christians, assuming they must be up to no good because all people inherently have the sin nature. You see, often times when we have judged another in the past, we have found ourselves to be wrong. The problem is, when we have spoken negatively against the person, other people know about that. This creates a lot of problems. One, it shows that the accuser really isn’t as in tune with God or in tune with the behavior around him or her as much as he or she thought they were. Two, it shows that the accuser really doesn’t practice the Word of God because he or she is supposed to believe the best about everyone, as the Apostle Paul makes clear. Three, it hurts the image of the accused so that now the person has to overcome the artificial (or rather false) presentation that has been made about them.
The great thing is, is that God is able to save those who are faithful to him, and he works to accomplish that. So, no matter what the situation, whether there has been a relationship that has gone into the frying pan, or whether someone has accused someone of doing something, God is able to guide the thoughts of people so that they make the right choices. The only thing is, is that people have to choose to be obedient to the Scripture and do what is right, rather than holding onto self-righteousness and continuing to choose the wrong. In the latter case, the person cannot grow, and likely will go through a similar situation in the future because their poor actions, whether consciously or subconsciously, will cause the past to repeat itself.
- Daniel Litton
Today’s Acknowledgements:
Psychologists David R. Hawkins and David D. Burns