Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro

In a book entitled Peace Child, Don Richardson records the moving account of how the Sawi people of Irian Jaya came to understand salvation through Jesus Christ.

For many months he and his family sought for some way to communicate the gospel to this tribe.

Then they discovered the key for which they had been praying.

All demonstrations of kindness expressed by the Sawi were regarded with suspicion except one act.

If a father gave his own son to his enemy, his sacrificial deed showed that he could be trusted!

Furthermore, everyone who touched that child was brought into a friendly relationship with the father.

The Sawi were then taught that in a similar way God’s beloved Son could bring them eternal peace.

Don Richardson and his family went to become missionaries to the Sawi people of West Paupa.

They went there to share with the native people the Gospel.

But for a long while no matter what they said message of the gospel did not get through.

They had learned the language, but it seemed like they were still mission something.

You see for the Sawi people acts of kindness from an outsider were always regarded with suspicion.

The Sawi people did not trust any would not trust anyone outside their own people.

So the idea of God showing them kindness did not resonate.

But eventually Don found that there was one slight exception to this.

He learned that if the Sawi people were at war with a neighbouring tribe there was one way to earn trust and make peace.

If the Chief of the tribe gave a peace child, that is if he gave his own son to the tribe they were at war with that would would then be at peace and there would be no more war.

When Don learned of this practice he immediately shared with the Sawi people that Jesus was God’s peace child.

He was given by the Father so that they no longer would be at war, but peace.

It was then that the Sawi people really heard the good news for the first time.

God in his wisdom is the great peacemaker and he sent his son Jesus to make peace.

To not simply create a cease fire but to bring shalom, wholeness, peace.

Don Richardson in his book Peace

God has made peace with us, but often the peace that a Christian has with God gets lost in translation when it comes to our friends and neighbors.

Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of God.

These are some of Jesus most famous words.

They are part of his famous sermon on the mount and are one of the eight beatitudes.

They are called this because the person who is truly blessed or happy in this life lives like this.

Jesus

Develop the idea that God’s wisdom has made peace with us

FCF: We know what it is like to have tense relationships, strained friendships, shaky marriages.

Our families are usually the most intense place where we can experience the lack of peace the most.

An alcoholic brother who refuses to get help.

Or an aunt who calls to gossip about so and so.

Can you believe what she did.

How dare he shame on him.

FCF: We know what it is like to experience tense relationships right.

The church is a great place to experience this.

Like our family our church is like an extended family.

We know what it is like to experience tense relationships right.

The church is a great place to experience this.

Like our family our church is like an extended family.

The next place we experience can experince this lack of peace is often in the church which is another type of extended family.

If you have been around the church for long you know how quickly relationships can get disordered.

But what we see in our passage this morning is that

The reasons: world the flesh and the devil

Because God has made peace with us we should make peace with one another

Because God has made peace with us we should make peace with one another

What are the consequences?

We should make peace with one another

And in order to make peace we need the right wisdom.

And in our passage we see two types of wisdom, the right kind, the wisdom from above and the wrong kind, the wisdom from below.

So first if we want to create a community that is peaceful let’s see what kind of wisdom we need to avoid.

The

Wisdom from Below

Look with me at James 3:14-15

Fist James shows what happens if our wisdom is from below.

You know you are not really a wise community if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition running a muck.

The bitter jealousy that James is talking about is a kind of zeal (the Greek word for jealousy is zelos which we get the word zeal) A kind of zeal for your own particular agenda especially when what you desire is being pushed aside.

Fist James shows what happens if our wisdom is from below.

You know you are not really a wise community if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition running a muck.

The bitter jealousy that James is talking about is a kind of zeal (the Greek word for jealousy is zelos which we get the word zeal) A kind of zeal for your own particular agenda especially when what you desire is being pushed aside.

James 3:14

James 3:

Fist James shows what happens if our wisdom is from below.

You know you are not really a wise community if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition running a muck.

The bitter jealousy that James is talking about is a kind of zeal (the Greek word for jealousy is zelos which we get the word zeal) A kind of zeal for your own particular agenda especially when what you desire is being pushed aside.

So let’s say you love fill in the blank - environmentalism, singing hymns, healing prayer, biblical theology, racial reconciliation, liturgical dance, underwater basket weaving.

Whatever it may be.

Let’s say its something good and you love it.

But you don’t feel like it gets enough air time.

That this other thing that you don’t care about AS MUCH seems to be talked about a lot, and what you desire is not recognized as much as you would like.

Well if you are not careful bitter jealousy can creep in.

An attitude that says: “Why do they get what they want, but I a get left in the dust.”

Now we might not think about this as bitter jealousy because we just feel is disappointed, frustrated, or even angry when what we desire is marginalized, but it is.

And if bitter jealousy sets then in comes selfish ambition, we start pushing our agenda at the expense of other people.

Or we simply take our talents to south beach or someplace else.

James says if bitter jealousy and selfish ambition are present it means that we have bought into a different kind of wisdom

Look with me at verse 15

earthly, nonspiritual and demonic.

Another way Christians have described these three evil forces is the world, the flesh, and the devil.

What James means by earthly are the empty promises and deadly deceits of the world.

So let’s say your particular desire is not getting much air time, the earthly wisdom of the world advises us that if we can’t give full expression to all our desires we are being inauthentic and untrue to ourselves.

And the wisdom of our culture there is probably no greater sin than not being true to your desires.

Secondly he share the source of wisdom from below

The World

The Flesh

And the un

And the unspiritual wisdom of our sinful flesh likes to hear this.

“Yeah why should I have to suppress my desires.”

And then there is a demonic element.

Yes demonic.

demonic forces are at play and in the case of jealousy and selfish ambition, the way they work is to amplify the worlds wisdom and twist God’s word so that our sin seems to be virtuous, or that sin is not really that big of deal, or demonic forces will misrepresent God’s desire.

The Devil

Illustration

So if we go back all the way to the beginning, in the garden with Adam and Eve, we can see how this might look.

God created Adam and Eve complete and whole and God told them and now look at this in

Now look at how the evil one places a seed of doubt

Genesis 3