Who Is To Blame For our Temptation?
James: Take it in and Live it out • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction
Introduction
What are some of the biggest temptations that you think people face in our world?
Study from a few years ago shared the following findings:
Worrying about everything - 60%
Procrastination - 60%
Eat too much - 55%
Spend too much time on Social Media - 44%
Lazy - 41%
Spend more money than one can afford - 35%
Gossip - 26%
Jealousy - 24%
This can be specific to yourself or generalized for our culture, why do we give into temptation as often as we do?
This same study asked people to list the main reason they succumb to temptation and here were the top 4 results:
I’m not sure - 50%
To escape my normal life - 20%
To feel less lonely - 8%
To satisfy the expectations of others - 7%
Temptation is a real thing and it is a real problem in our world. We all face it and we all struggle with different types of temptation. Last week we looked at the opening 11 verses in James and were encouraged to rejoice in times of trials because we know that God works in our trials to produce something good. Today’s lesson will dive into those trials a little deeper and look at the different options that we have in those hard moments. We can give into temptation or we can trust in God. The problem that we often have whenever we fall short is that we are tempted to blame others for our issues. Could someone read Genesis 3:12-13 to see this truth?
12 The man replied, “The woman you gave to be with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate.”
13 So the Lord God asked the woman, “What have you done?” And the woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
Adam and Eve sinned against God in the Garden and ate of the forbidden fruit and what was their natural response? To blame someone for their mistake. Adam blames Eve and Eve blames the serpent. Who are some people that we like to blame today for our sins and mistakes?
Satan
Enemy
Person in leadership
God?
James will instruct us today how this is foolish by looking into the origin and anatomy of sin as well as the faithfulness of our God.
Could someone start us off this morning by reading James 1:12-15?
12 Blessed is the one who endures trials, because when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.
13 No one undergoing a trial should say, “I am being tempted by God,” since God is not tempted by evil, and he himself doesn’t tempt anyone.
14 But each person is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own evil desire.
15 Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is fully grown, it gives birth to death.
Last week we looked at rejoicing during our trials because God is accomplishing something in them even when we can’t fully see what He’s doing. James 1:12 shares with us the conclusion of persevering through trials: We receive the crown of life. Is James making the argument here that only the perfect Christians receive this crown? Look at the end of verse 12. Who has God promised this crown to? Those who love Him. The standard is perfection but Christ has accomplished that standard for His people. Can you imagine the burden of having to always maintain your own salvation / assurance by your perfection and whenever you messed up there was no grace? Where’s the hope there!? A better way of understanding this reward situation is not that our perfection saves us… only Jesus’ work can do that… but that instead our perseverance under trials and trust in Jesus along the way enables us to receive God’s spiritual blessing. We don’t endure in order to be saved… We endure because we are saved. As we endure, God rewards that faithfulness but that reward rarely is an earthly reward - it’s not the happy, healthy, and wealthy reward many look for… Instead it’s Revelation 2:10
10 Don’t be afraid of what you are about to suffer. Look, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison to test you, and you will experience affliction for ten days. Be faithful to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life.
17 For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory.
As we understand this, we can rejoice in our trials because we know that God is accomplishing something in us today and as we stand firm in Him, we know that He see’s that.
Who is Responsible?
Who is Responsible?
As we go through our trial, we know that God is in control and doing something and that we can have joy in it… but we also have a temptation to think God, in our trial, is tempting us to sin. We’re going to look at this more in depth this morning in Hebrews 3:7-19, but we see in the Bible that God does test us. Could someone read Genesis 22:1-2?
1 After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am,” he answered.
2 “Take your son,” he said, “your only son Isaac, whom you love, go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.”
Now, God tested Abraham and God tests us today as well! In the middle of this test there would have been a temptation to not do what God commanded. And here is the problem that we have with this idea at times. God tests us but we feel tempted to sin at times in the test. What are some temptations that you’ve experienced in the trials you’ve faced in your life?
Not trusting in God to provide in a health or financial situation
Questioning God’s love because of the loss of a loved one
Thinking that God is not just because we’re suffering
What does James 1:13 tell us about these trials? Who is responsible for our temptation, us our God?
Clearly us because God is not tempted by evil and He cannot tempt anyone to do evil because He by definition is good! We are responsible for our temptations and this is because of our fallen, sinful nature.
Look at verse 14 - we are tempted by our own evil desires. We can’t blame God, we can’t even blame the Devil or our enemy… the responsibility for our sin lies with ourselves. We can’t pass the buck. Why do you think this is so hard for us to fully understand? Why do we not like accepting responsibility for our sinfulness?
God’s plan is perfect even if we don’t fully understand it or agree with it - think of a test that God has either given you or someone in the Bible that were ultimately for good!
Joseph in Egypt - Genesis 50:20
20 You planned evil against me; God planned it for good to bring about the present result—the survival of many people.
God provided something good to come out of this test! This is true throughout His Word.
So often, though, we miss this because of our sinfulness. David Platt shares that sin has a 4 fold process:
Deception
Desire
Disobedience
Death
stress how Genesis 3 fits this 4-step process. Eve believes the lie. She sees that the fruit looks good. She eats the fruit. That sin leads to death!
We’ll talk about this more this morning in Hebrews, but sin leads to unbelief and this means a simple failure to believe in God and His promises. If you look at James 1:14-15, how do you see this process play out? Where do we have to stop this process at the first place?
We have to stop sin in our hearts and run away from it! Sin starts with a distorted thought process and whenever we give into that distortion, we will be destroyed. Ultimately, sin wants us to be our own Lord but this view leads to our death.
We must be born again or else we will die whenever sin fully metastasizes and gives way to physical and spiritual death
Jared Wilson, “Born once, die twice. Born twice, die once.”
We’re all sinners and we all give into temptation - if we’re not born again we’ll die physically and be separated from God for all eternity… But, if we are saved by grace through faith in Christ then we’ll only face a physical death because we’ll be united with our God forever. We don’t have to fear the grave as a Christian because Jesus has conquered sin and death once and for all in our place!
Many people talk about sin as if it just happened. “I fell into sin” meaning that they didn’t plan on doing something crazy or wrong but it just happened. How does this passage of Scripture fight against this idea? Is sin sudden like tripping on the stairs or is it like a progressive road that gradually leads us away from God’s design?
Again, David Platt’s example of sin being a process is helpful as we combat it. We can starve it out before it leads to eternal consequences
Illustration of a road. Some pastors have talked about our desire to sin and give into temptation as a road. God has put us on the road and there are things that he sends our way, but He also provides an off-ramp like we have along the interstate that we can get off before we give into the temptation. Think of a car accident coming up ahead on the interstate and your GPS tells you that there is a faster route ahead if you take the exit and go on a detour so that you avoid the traffic up ahead. That’s what God does so often in our lives - there’s a trial and there’s temptation lurking up ahead and trying to get our eyes off of God’s plan. Ultimately, God provides another way - He always provides a way for us to trust in Him and avoid the consequences of our temptation, but often we ignore that way out and we give into the temptation and often we blame God for our sinfulness
James shares that we can’t do this because God is perfectly faithful.
God is Faithful!
God is Faithful!
The second half of this passage focuses on God’s goodness and faithfulness rather than our faithlessness. James will share with us that instead of falling victim to temptation, we can pass the test by trusting in God’s faithfulness as we turn to Him alone to provide - could someone read James 1:16-18?
16 Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters.
17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.
18 By his own choice, he gave us birth by the word of truth so that we would be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.
Some might think that God is tempting them - what does this passage of Scripture share with us that our God actually does?
God actually gives us good gifts.
Which temptation do you think more people give into: Forgetting how sinful we are, or forgetting how good God is?
Both!
What do we learn about Who our God is in these 3 verses?
He is Sovereign
He is the Father of lights - He is the Creator of all things and reigns as King over His Creation
He is Dependable
He does not change like the shifting shadows. Everything in our world is in motion, even the stars in the night sky… but our God stays the same
He is Gracious
He gives us life / birth through Jesus Christ even though we couldn’t earn this ourselves
“God Won’t Give You More than You Can Handle” - how many of you have heard this phrase?
Where is that in the Bible? It’s certainly not here in James 1:12-18 as some argue that it is.
Is cancer, loss of loved one, anxiety more than you can handle by yourself?
Absolutely!
Where is the hope in the Bible? It’s not that God won’t send us through tests and trials. It’s not that He promises us a suffering free life - it’s that He promises to be with us through the suffering and provide a way for us to grow through the trial and glorify Him. God DOES give us more than we can handle so that we HAVE to trust in Him alone!
14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold as a slave under sin.
15 For I do not understand what I am doing, because I do not practice what I want to do, but I do what I hate.
16 Now if I do what I do not want to do, I agree with the law that it is good.
17 So now I am no longer the one doing it, but it is sin living in me.
18 For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh. For the desire to do what is good is with me, but there is no ability to do it.
19 For I do not do the good that I want to do, but I practice the evil that I do not want to do.
20 Now if I do what I do not want, I am no longer the one that does it, but it is the sin that lives in me.
21 So I discover this law: When I want to do what is good, evil is present with me.
22 For in my inner self I delight in God’s law,
23 but I see a different law in the parts of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and taking me prisoner to the law of sin in the parts of my body.
24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?
25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with my mind I myself am serving the law of God, but with my flesh, the law of sin.
We still struggle against sin because of our sinful nature - but because we are born again, we don’t have to give into the temptation to sin, God provides a way out! What does that look like?
Illustration of Augustine - church leader in 4th-5th century. Augustine wanted nothing to do with Jesus early on in his life and his mom traveled from Carthage to Milan, across the Mediterranean Sea and begged him to go to church. He went and heard a man named Ambrose simply preach the Gospel and eventually Augustine was converted and born again. He was walking to his home shortly after this moment and a woman that he had formerly lived with saw him walking and said hello to him but he kept on walking. She ran after him and caught up to him and said, “Augustine, it is I!” Augustine replied and said, “I know, but it is no longer I.” This is how Christ changes things as we are born again and He gives us a good gift of a new heart. This doesn’t mean that we won’t be tempted to sin - Augustine was shortly after his conversion and this is true in our world today as temptation never stops! But, with Jesus, we can faithfully follow Him and succeed in these trials and tests.
God is faithful - He saves us and He sustains us with good gifts of life!
Wrap Up
Wrap Up
What are 2 things that God never does?
Tempt people
Be tempted by evil
Hebrews 4:15 - Jesus was tempted but never sinned
What are 2 things that only come from God?
Every good gift
Gospel and Salvation - we can’t save ourselves
Douglas Moo, “Christian maturity is not indicated by the infrequency of temptation but by the infrequency of succumbing to temptation.”
As we go throughout this week, temptation will come. But God always provides a way out - we can pass “the test” by trusting in Him alone.