Deciding How to Live

[This was shared during the 10:15 AM worship with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, today.]

James 3:13-4:8
Robert Frost’s famous poem, The Road Not Taken, begins:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could. 

Anyone who has ever had to make a decision in life can identify with those lines. We all must make decisions.

Some decisions we make, of course, have more importance than others.

The career path we will follow.

Who we will marry.

How much effort we will choose to put into our relationships.

What to do in caring for elderly parents.

Life is filled with consequential decisions and, as we make them, we feel the need for wisdom.

In today’s second lesson, James, the earthly brother of Jesus and leader of the Christians in Jerusalem, says that there are two kinds of wisdom. And the consequences these two divergent forms of wisdom bring into our lives are dramatically different. Turn please to the lesson, James 3:13-4:8.

James begins with a question:

“Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him [or her] show by good conduct that his [or her] works are done in the meekness of wisdom.” 

Now, truth be told, we don’t like being told to be meek. We flinch when Jesus says, in the Sermon on the Mount, “the meek will inherit the earth.” But, we don’t want to inherit the earth. We want it now! We’re not into delayed gratification.

And if the rows of self-help books you find in most bookstores are any indication, our idea of wisdom has to do with being shrewd and bold about getting what we want when we want it, no matter who or what gets in the way.

James well describes the shrewd, plotting wisdom that the world usually recommends to us:

"But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly [from the world, not from God in heaven], sensual [it gratifies the parts of us slated for death], demonic [from hell, the place of everlasting punishment and condemnation for those who turn their backs on Jesus Christ]. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there." 

The problem with the wisdom generated by human beings is that it’s me-centered. Buy into the “wisdom” of this world and you may achieve things that the world considers great, but you will not be in alignment with God’s will that we love God and love others as we love ourselves. You will, as Jesus says, "gain the world and lose your life."

This sort of death-dealing wisdom even has been given place in the twenty-first century Church.

For example, some conservative denominations and Christian megachurches wrap Jesus in the American flag to justify everything about American traditions and values, to give them the sheen of holiness. In doing so, they subordinate Jesus to the United States, engaging in an idolatry that appeals to those who are certain that, even if God isn't a Republican or a Democrat, a conservative, liberal, libertarian, or socialist, God is an American. This false wisdom may help churches get along with people who would rather not be confronted with the truth about the flaws of this nation we love, but it will leave the people who accept it far from the true God of the universe we know in Jesus.

Sadly, many embrace other forms of false and worldly wisdom in the so-called "liberal" denominations, like our own Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

An official web site of our ELCA, called Living Lutheran, recently published a sermon by Pastor Delmer Chilton, an assistant to the bishop of the ELCA’s Southeastern Synod. His text was Mark 7:24-37, a passage of the Bible that we looked at a few weeks ago. It deals with Jesus’ encounter with a Syrophoenician woman, a Gentile, a non-Jew, whose daughter had a demon.

Jesus, you’ll remember, at first appears to refuse the woman her request. “Let the children [by which Jesus means the children of Israel] be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” “Dogs” was the put-down term Jews used about Gentiles, who they believed could never be saved from sin and death nor be right with God. But we know that Jesus came to die and rise for all people, giving eternal life to all who turn from sin and believe in Him alone as God and authority over their lives.

We also know that Jesus is God the Son: all-knowing, all-powerful. “The Father and I are one,” Jesus tells us [John 10:30].

So, we are momentarily mystified by Jesus’ seeming refusal of this woman’s request.

But as we pointed out a few weeks ago, the word that Jesus uses for dogs is the word for puppies. The Syrophoenician woman immediately picks up on Jesus’ playful phrasing, understanding not only that Jesus is going to grant her request, but that He is using this incident as a memorable sign that His grace can reach and change the life of any person, whatever their nationality or former religious persuasion. As Jesus will put it elsewhere in Mark’s gospel, “The one who believes in Me and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe in Me will be condemned.”

In his ELCA official web site sermon, Delmer Chilton ignores all that Jesus claims about Himself throughout the rest of the gospels and says that Jesus really was going to turn the Syrophoenician woman down until she taught Jesus what it means to be God and Savior of the world. Chilton claims that after this encounter, “Jesus stands corrected...the woman has helped Jesus understand a difficult part of Scripture and a difficult part of his call.”

Folks, this is the cunning, shrewd, self-serving wisdom of the world dressed up as Christianity. It’s the same kind of sin the devil has been enticing proud people into embracing since the garden of Eden.

You see, if you whittle God down to your size, then you, not God, can call the shots. You can tell God how to be God. You can decide what truths in God’s Word you’ll accept as authoritative over your life and what ones you’ll ignore or denigrate. It allows you to remake Christian truth in ways that are more palatable to you.

Operating from the same mindset, the pastor of an ELCA congregation in Santa Fe, New Mexico told another newspaper a few weeks ago that Bible “is not a talking book” [a surprise to anyone who’s been taught that the Bible is the Word of God in which God speaks to us] and then, he asserted, the Bible “doesn’t tell me what to do.”

Turn please, to 2 Timothy 3:16. It says:

“All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof [that means censuring or rebuking for wandering away from God’s will], for correction, for instruction in righteousness...” 

There are things we may not understand in the Bible, but it is the living Word of God, the place we go to find hope, salvation, truth, and God's will for our lives. It records God's definitive disclosure of Himself, first to ancient Israel and ultimately to all the world, through Jesus Christ. This is the God Who will give us wisdom for every decision we may face in life, if will will only ask for it in Jesus' Name. James 1:5 reminds us: “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him [or her] ask God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given...”

The kind of wisdom that we need isn’t the wisdom of the world, or of the devil, or even from within ourselves. James describes it in James 3:17: “But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.”

Life is too big for us to figure it out on our own.

We need the wisdom God gives to those who humbly surrender their lives to Jesus Christ. Look again at our text, at James 4:7-8:

“Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”

In my own life, whether before I turned from atheism to faith in Christ or in the years since I fell in love with Jesus, I have always gotten into spiritual danger, relational danger, and the danger of forgetting who God made me to be and who Christ, by His cross and resurrection, freed me to be in when I do three different things.

I've gotten into trouble when I have followed my own thoughtful analysis of circumstances, instead of following Jesus. God gave us our brains. So, we are to use them. But if my brain isn't subordinated to the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ, I will inevitably make unwise choices. As Proverbs 14:12 reminds us: “There is a way that seems right to [human beings], but its end is the way of death.”

I've also gotten myself into trouble when I have followed my heart instead of following Jesus. God gave us our emotions and they can bless our lives. But if my heart isn't subordinated to Jesus Christ, I make unwise decisions. Jeremiah 17:9 says that the human heart "is devious above all else; it is perverse..."

I've also gotten myself into trouble when I've followed the crowd or some individual I respect or like, instead of following Christ. Proverbs 11:14 tells us, "Where there is no guidance, a nation falls, but in abundance of counselors there is safety." It's good to get the advice of other people. But if those other people aren't following Jesus, their advice is, at best, suspect.

I've gotten myself into trouble in life then, when I haven't followed the wisdom of God.

But, how can we operate from God’s wisdom, rather than the wisdom of the world?

For me, one passage of Scripture seems to best summarize God’s counsel and command for those who want to live in the wisdom of God every day of their lives.

Please turn to Romans 12:1-2.

It says:

“I beseech you therefore, [brothers and sisters], by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Wisdom--as well as life, hope, and joy--comes to those who give their all to the God Who gave His all to us in Jesus Christ. Wisdom comes to those who surrender to Christ! 

Jesus says, “...wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction [that is, to hell and separation from God], and there are many who [take this route]...[But] narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life and there are few who find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14)

We all have decisions to make in life. Surrender to Jesus Christ and God will guide you to make wise choices.

Sometimes those choices will lead you through pain and growth and maturity you’d just as soon not acquire.

But when you choose to follow Jesus Christ, you will always be living wisely.

You will always be on the way that leads to life. Amen

The Way of Wisdom

[This was shared during worship with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, this morning.]

James 3:13-4:8
When Muhammad Ali was heavyweight boxing champion of the world, he was supposedly a passenger on a commercial flight that developed some problems. As you know, Ali never appeared to lack confidence. He called himself--and as a boxer, may have been--"the greatest." The airline attendant announced that because of some turbulence, all passengers needed to fasten their seat belts. “Superman don’t need no seat belt,” Ali told the stewardess. “That’s true,” she replied, “But Superman don’t need no plane either. Fasten your seat belt.”

It’s a fine thing for us to have confidence. I believe that God wants us to feel confident in ourselves, children made in the very image of God. I believe that God wants those of us for whom Jesus Christ died and rose--the whole human race--to feel good about ourselves. But arrogance is an altogether different thing.

The wisdom of the world says that pushing your way to the top is just the way things are supposed to be. But, in our second lesson for today, James reminds us that isn’t the wisdom that comes from the God we know in Jesus Christ. And this me-first, pseudo-wisdom of the world has its consequences. James tells us: “Who is wise and understanding among you? Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind... “

Followers of Jesus Christ know that arrogance is inconsistent with our faith. We know that it leads us to kill one another, if not literally, then with our words, actions, and attitudes.*

We know, too, that Christ gives to all who turn from sin and follow Him, all who grasp God’s grace, the unshakable approval of God.

We know that we have God in our corners forever, helping us to become our best selves.

Yet the war in the gut that James writes about in our lesson today happens inside those of us who believe in Jesus Christ as much as it does in non-Christians.

Why is that? Why do we Christians refuse to allow the wisdom that God willingly gives all followers of Christ, just for the asking, to guide our lives?

Some psychologists tell us that we all live out of certain stories that we tell ourselves about ourselves. Sometimes, we live out of stories of arrogance, which is bad, of course.

Often, our self-told stories cause us to sell ourselves short, believing that we’re not enough. This is equally destructive. I know Christians, for example, who think that they’re not faithful enough to get God’s attention. A man in one of my former parishes, one who was about the most faithful person I'd ever known said to me once, "I'm not really much of a Christian, pastor." "What do you mean?" I asked. "You believe in Jesus Christ. You've sought God's forgiveness for sin. You seek to live according to God's will each day. God says you're good enough because you trust Christ with your life. It's only you who believe otherwise!"

James would say that all these stories come from the devil.

And because we believe those stories, we make shambles of our lives, often compensating for our perceived inadequacies by adopting attitudes of arrogance.

But whether the stories we tell ourselves lead us to feelings of arrogance or inadequacy, the result is that we never tap into the power, love, and goodness of God to feel confident about who we are as children of God.

“Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from?” James asks. “Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And you covet something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes and conflicts.”

Tragically, the terrible consequences of believing these false stories about ourselves can be seen not only in the lives of individual Christians, but also in the lives of many Christian congregations.

Gerald Mann tells the true story of a pastor and his family who had something horrible happen as they were arriving in a new community where a local church had called them. Just as they entered the town, their baby, the couple's only child had a seizure. They rushed him to the local hospital where all attempts to revive him failed. There, in the hospital waiting room where she’d gotten the horrible news, the mother was understandably distraught and screamed out to God, occasionally using profanity.

One of the nurses on duty was a member of the congregation. She told the congregational leaders how the grieving mother had initially reacted to the death of her child. Those leaders, in turn, went to their denomination’s area superintendent to say that because of how “unspiritual” the pastor’s wife was, they wanted a different pastor.

The superintendent told those leaders that the members of that church needed to learn what it is to be the church, a fellowship where imperfect people can share the strength and the power to live which the resurrected Jesus gives to all who believe in Him.

The congregational leaders didn’t like that answer at all. And so, the president of the congregation pulled the new pastor aside and said, “Well, I guess we’re stuck with you. But don’t you ever mention the death of your son or any pain you may be going through. We hired you to make us feel good, not to join you in your family’s difficulties.”

Here you had a congregation whose members believed a false story. They believed that if their pastor had an imperfect life, it would make their lives less perfect. He violated the story they were telling about themselves and they didn’t want him messing the story up by telling the truth that this life isn’t always perfect and that while followers of Christ aren’t always strong, we have a God to Whom we can go for strength and we have the Church in which we can be strengthened by God together.

The Church is the practical, real-life laboratory where Jesus Christ gives us new eternal identities born not of looking out for number one, but of letting Number One look out for us and where God’s children look out for each other.

But how does that happen? James says it happens when we ask God to help us own the humble confidence and self-assurance that belong to His children. It comes, he says, when we submit, we surrender to Christ. That’s when we quit having to prove ourselves, bask in God’s approval, and can look beyond ourselves.

“You do not have,” James says, “because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures...Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.”

In an old folk tale, a woman loses her only child. She goes to the local holy man and asks him to bring the child back to life. He tells her, “Search for the home that has never known sorrow, and, in that home, find the magic mustard seed and bring it to me. Then we will have the power to bring your child back.”

The woman’s first stop was a palace. Sure that everything would be good and joyful there, she knocked on the door, explaining that she was looking for a home without sorrow. “You’ve come to the wrong place,” she was told. And then the owner of that palace recounted all the sorrows that he and his family had experienced in spite of their wealth. The woman thought to herself, “Who is better able to help these people than I, who have had such misfortune of my own?” So, she stayed to comfort them.

Later, she continued her search. She went from hovels to palaces and in each place, she got so involved in helping other people through their griefs that she was able to deal with her own. In forgetting about herself, she found healing and peace.

Arrogance destroys faith, fellowship, and hope. Buying into false stories, whether they’re ones that tell us how great we are or how insignificant we are, or how aggrieved we are, creates conflicts within us and creates our conflicts with others.

Humble surrender to Jesus Christ, allowing Him to enlist us in His army of love for God, love for neighbor, and respect for the earth that God has given to us (1) builds faith, (2) enhances fellowship, and (3) fills us with hope.

The wisdom of hell tells us to look out for ourselves. The wisdom of heaven says to look up to Christ. One road leads to turmoil within and turmoil without. The other, the road of following Jesus Christ, leads to peace in our souls and peace with others.

Which road will you choose? Which story will you believe, your own story about you or the story Jesus Christ has created just for you? On whose wisdom will you build your life, your own or that of God?

*In Matthew 5:21-22, Jesus says, “You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, "You shall not murder'; and "whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.' But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, "You fool,' you will be liable to the hell of fire.”