September 12, 2004

John W. Fowler

Scripture: James 4:13-17

The book of James is a book of practical Christianity, written by the brother of our Lord Jesus, who grew up seeing Christianity lived out, so he speaks authoritively about what real Christianity, authentic Christianity should look like. And he gets to chapter 4, as he has been exhorting those people, Ananias as well, to live the faith, put our faith into action, he wants to remind us that, now, he doesn’t want us just to be busy, and then — oh, by the way — ask God to bless it; he wants you to be sure it is the Lord’s will that you are being busy about, to learn when you face the future to take to pray and to seek God about: Is this His will, or not. In chapter 4, verse 13 he says it this way:

Think for a few moments this morning about how do you face the future. Sometimes we look to experts about facing the future. I guarantee you, anyone who is in the path of a hurricane that is coming, right now is tuning to the weather channel and listening to that hurricane expert. Why? Because they have a vested interest in that. They are hoping that they know what they are talking about.

Back in 1893 there were some experts, sociologists, at the Chicago World’s Fair that made some predictions about some hundred years into the future which, I think those are safe predictions to make — I mean, who’s going to come back and tell you that you were wrong? Anyway, back in 1893 they made three bold predictions: one is that prisons would be almost non-existent; we just wouldn’t need them. A second one is that the divorce rate would just go way down and they would almost be non-existent. And then another one is that they didn’t think it would be unusual for people to live to be a hundred and fifty years old. They were very optimistic at the turn of the nineteenth century.

Back in 1967 some futurists appeared before the Senate. What was their concern? Well, they were concerned with the rise of technology — that we are going to have a big problem on our hands by the mid-eighties— and that a big problem would be that we would have so much spare time we wouldn’t know what to do with it. They were predicting that within twenty years the average worker would work, I think, twenty-two hours a week, twenty-eight weeks a year and retire at age thirty-eight. I don’t know anybody that is retired by thirty-eight. They might want to, but financially, they can’t retire at thirty-eight. But, sometimes we look to the experts, the psychics — astrology people — look to that. I don’t usually do that; I tuned into the horoscope this week. Today it said that you are not going to make any money for what you are doing. I hope they are wrong; I enjoy getting a paycheck. I’ve got two in college, but we will see. Another one, I think it was Saturday, said that you need to put your heart into what you are doing. Well, I’m all for that. Wednesday they said, “If you are worrying about whether you have the wrong partner, you need to decide whether you can work together.” Well, I don’t need advice like that so I am not going back to the horoscopes at all.

But, generally the option that I choose more often than I care to admit is the option of worry and fear about the future. How do we resist that temptation and really face the future, as James says, with faith, with seeking God’s will for the future? Well, first of all in this passage he shares three mistakes that we oftentimes make when we face the future. The first on is that we plan without God. When you are doing your planning, does God have a part in it? Does He have a place in it? He says it this way:

James is writing at a time where a lot of businesses were being started and entrepreneurs, businessmen, would go in and see the opportunity to start a business, make money, sell the business, make a profit. Nothing wrong with making a profit; nothing wrong with being a businessman. What James was saying though, was, “Don’t leave God out of your business.” R.J. Letourneau — if you can ever get his biography — it was written years ago: Mover of Men and Mountains. R. J. Letourneau was a contractor, very gifted, just really near genius. He designed a lot of the machines today that move dirt. (That’s one thing I have enjoyed about the building project: You can look outside and see all the different machinery moving dirt around here.) But he designed many of those. He took his Christian faith very seriously in his business and very plainly said, “I decided to make God my business partner.” Well, what does that look like? Well, for one, nobody worked on Sunday. One time they were under a lot of pressure to finish, as contractors are. They stopped Saturday night at midnight. They started back up Sunday at midnight, but he wouldn’t budge about that. Kind of like Chick-filet — “We’re not open on Sunday.” But then, well, what do you do when you start making a lot of money? Well, he had a simple plan for that. He just started giving God more money. In fact, toward the end of his life, he lived on ten percent and he gave God ninety percent. What is James talking about, not just for businessmen? He wants all of us to plan the future with God. Pray about it. Don’t just move ahead and assume that God’s for it. What was wrong with the Tower of Babel in the Book of Genesis. I mean, they were together, a great building project, but it was for them; they didn’t want to glorify God; they left Him out.

Another mistake we make, that James says, is we presume about tomorrow. We just assume that we are going to have tomorrow, we are going to have so many years, where we forget about the brevity of life. In James, chapter 14, it says it this way:

In Luke, chapter 12, Jesus told the parable of the rich fool. This was a man who was making lots and lots of money. His barns were not big enough for all his crops, so he said, “I’ve got to have bigger barns.” So he tore them down and built bigger ones and then he died and there was no provision for what would happen to all the great harvest that he had. But Jesus was saying of this man, that he was presuming upon the future. I have been at a lot of gravesides and, you know, in one of the psalms we read, Psalm 90, where Moses writes:

Regardless of how long we have — forty years, sixty or ninety — it’s a short time. This poem says it this way:

As we get older we realize that we really don’t have a long time here and we can’t be presumptuous about tomorrow.

And another mistake we make, according to James, is that we put off doing good. In verse 17 it says:

Can you think of something that God has been nudging you to do but you keep procrastinating? You are going to do it, but you are going to do it tomorrow. Then when tomorrow comes, you wait ‘til tomorrow. Is there anything you are putting off that you really need to get done? Someone that didn’t do that was a man named Albert that was born in 1875. By the time he was thirty, he had accomplished a lot already. He had two doctorates — theology and philosophy, I believe. He was a preacher. He was a professor. He was a concert organist; in fact, he was an expert in Bach. He built organs. But then, he felt that God was calling him to go to medical school. I was just envisioning what his parents felt about that, already has two doctorates and then announces at age thirty, “I’m going to med school.” But that’s what he did. Seven years later, where does he go? He goes with his new bride to west Africa, starts a hospital, and for the next fifty-two years Albert Schweitzer is treating up to a thousand people a day with love and care and medicine and faith.

Now, if you do what God wants you to do, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you are going to go to Africa. It doesn’t necessarily mean you are going to be like Albert Schweitzer. But it does mean that you are willing to follow the path that God has for you; you are going to take what God has blessed you with and you are going to use it for the benefit of others. And people will mourn when you leave this earth.

But what does James tell us that we need to do? Well, he says the faith solution of facing the future is that we say, “Is it the Lord’s will?” We face it with faith. We ask if it is God’s will. Apparently a hundred years ago a lot of times people would sign their letters with D.V. — deo volente — the Latin word for God Willing. Do you hear that expression very much any more — The Lord willing? You certainly see that in Paul’s writings. He will say, “I will come, the Lord willing.” He says that a lot.

When you look in the Bible about the Lord’s will — a couple of things I wanted to share with you. First of all is that when the Bible speaks of God’s will, it’s a good thing. Ask yourself today, are you convinced that God’s will is the greatest life possible for you? Or is it just some duty that you ought to do, that somehow you are going to have to tweak His plan in order to really enjoy it? But is it the best life possible?

I was listening a little bit to Henry Blackaby’s Experiencing God: Knowing and Doing the Will of God tape It came out in 1990 and is still popular, but was very popular in the 1990s, as popular as The Purpose Driven Life is today by Rick Warren. Why? Because people are hungry to know that God has a plan for my life and want to do the will of God. And Blackaby points out very much this love relationship: God loves us and that’s what you need to get a hold of first off.

Then he talks about that, oftentimes we say, “Well, God, what do you want me to do?” His focus though is not so much on us, it’s on: God, what are you doing? And then: How can I be a part of that? He uses the example of the call of Moses. Moses, out in the wilderness — the burning bush — he hears the call of God and God tells him, “I’m going to deliver the children of Israel from slavery. They have been in bondage for four-hundred and thirty years, and I want to use you.”

He didn’t tell Moses, “You’re going to deliver them.” He said, “I want to use you.” And for Moses that created a crisis. Well, can I do that? Will I do that? But he did decide to obey.

And what Blackaby says is, “When we believe that God’s will is good, we have to make adjustments in our lives to do His will.” Again, are you convinced that God’s will is good for your life?

And then secondly, God’s will gives us hope. When we face the future, I think, so oftentimes I have been discouraged or afraid about how things are going to turn out, I come back to the promises of the word of God. We sing the gospel hymn:

And what that hymn is talking about is, by faith we really believe these promises. Some of the promises I love, especially the forty-sixth psalm:

I think of that prayer service on September 14, 2001, Billy Graham quoting that psalm — with his white hair and still a little touch of Parkinson’s — but, you know, here is a man of faith, saying that God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in times of trouble.

One of the promises I cling to and seek to stand upon is: His grace is sufficient. When Paul prayed for the thorn in the flesh to be removed, God’s answer to him was,

“My grace is sufficient to you Paul, for my power is made perfect in your weakness.”

You’ve done that, haven’t you? You’ve prayed, “God, just take it away; I want this problem to go away.”

What His answer is though is, “I want to give you more grace. I’m going to take you through this. I’m going to show you how to cope with it.”

God’s grace is amazing, and sometimes the promise we need to stand upon is the promise of strength. In Isaiah, toward the end of that chapter, it said,

Waiting on the Lord means that we pray. It’s not being passive; it really isn’t. We are simply asking God for His perspective on what we are having to deal with.

Another promise I love, again especially when I don’t understand why things are happening the way they are: Romans 8:18:

I don’t have it all figured out, but I know that God is still sovereign; he loves me; He’s going to work it for His good. Oftentimes what God does when… (tape change)

…… was used greatly by God. God wants to give you courage and give you hope as you seek His will for the future. And then, as we face the future, we know God’s will is good; His will gives us hope, but specifically, what does Jesus say about facing the future? Well, four things I would like to share with you. (Keep on; just listen a little bit longer.)

First of all, He says, “Don’t worry.” In the Sermon on the Mount He says,

If you have a habit of worrying, just don’t do it. Don’t worry, but rather trust the Lord; seek His Kingdom. Jesus said,

And then in Matthew 25, He has three stories I’ll share with you briefly: The first one tells us when we face the future with faith, we need to be ready. What do we need to be ready for? Christ is coming back! We don’t preach about it as much in the Methodist Church as much as we should, but in Matthew 25 it’s all in the context of: He’s coming back. When’s He coming back? We don’t know, but He is coming back.

And He told the story of ten bridesmaids. Five had enough oil in their lamps; five didn’t. When the bridegroom came, five had to go get more oil. When they came back the door was shut and they couldn’t get in. What Jesus is saying is, you need to be ready. Are you ready for the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ? Are you ready to meet Him?

And then third, we need to be faithful. He told the story of a master who gave out talents. To one he gave five talents; one was given two talents; another was given one talent. The one who was given five was faithful. He entered into the joy of his master. Why? Because he made good use of what he had been given. The one who had two talents, he did as well. He entered into the joy of the master. But the one who had one talent — he hid his talent; he didn’t use it for the Lord. And Jesus’ response to him was: “You lazy and wicked servant!” Why so harsh? Because he was not using what God had given to him. How do we have faith for the future? We say, “Is it the Lord’s will,” and we go forth with confidence that God is with us. How do you face the future? With worry or with faith and hope?

Two men, over fifty years ago were rising stars with Youth With Christ. Ones name was Billy Graham. Ones name was Charles Templeton. Billy Graham was one of the youngest college presidents at that time; he was thirty-one years old. Charles Templeton was considered the more effective preacher of the two, although more people came down when Billy had the alter calls than when Charles Templeton did. Charles Templeton, though, had questions about the Bible and he went on to seminary. The only problem is, when he examined his faith, he just left seminary with more doubts than convictions.

He eventually left the ministry, moved to Toronto, became a media personality — a journalist. They stayed in touch, were friends up until Charles Templeton’s death but some fifty years later, in 1999, Templeton wrote a book about My Reasons for Rejecting the Christian Faith. He died two years later. Billy Graham, well, in 1959 he was struggling with his faith. He too had some doubts about the Bible. You wouldn’t know it to hear him today or ever, but he did as a young man. He was invited to a Forest Home Retreat Center, one that Henrietta Meers, a Christian Educator at First Presbyterian in Hollywood, California — Henrietta Meers went there and built up the Sunday School from four-hundred and fifty to four-thousand, five hundred, so obviously this woman was successful at getting people to study the Bible. She too had had questions about the Bible, but where she came back out that, it’s God’s Book, and she taught it with power and conviction.

Billy Graham prayed at that retreat center. With tears streaming down his eyes, he said, “Lord, by faith, I don’t have it all figured out, but I want to believe that this is Your book.”

And the rest is history. God gave him a powerful conviction that this book is truly His book and he went on from there to the Los Angeles Crusade where he became famous. What is the difference? One faced the future with doubts and fears and went off in a totally different direction. The other one faced it with faith and was willing to be used by God.

Are you willing to be used by Him? Face the future with faith. Let us pray.