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James 1:13-27
! Introduction
Years of practice have permitted me to be able to blow up a balloon with my ear.
I carefully put the balloon over my ear and close my mouth and nose so no air leaks out and with great effort am able to blow up this balloon.
When I do this, the truth appears to be that I can actually blow up the balloon with my ear.
You know very well that this can not be true and so although the truth appears to be one thing, it is actually something else.
That is what deception is - a distortion of the truth.
You know that you are being deceived, but sometimes we don’t know that we are deceived.
In the passage in James 1 which we are looking at today, we are told three times to be very careful about deception.
In 1:16 - “Don’t be deceived,” 1:22,26 we are cautioned against “deceiving ourselves.”
Of course, we are not talking about the interesting deception of slight of hand, but a much more serious spiritual deception which has a great impact on our life.
As we examine spiritual deception we notice that there are two different kinds of deception talked about here, both serious, one more dangerous than the other.
If we are deceived because we have not understood the truth, that is one kind of deception.
It is serious because not understanding the truth properly will result in ways of living based on things which are not true and can result in damage to ourselves and others.
For example, if we do not know that this symbol means poison, we could put ourselves in danger.
The remedy for this kind of deception is simply learning what the truth is.
Today we will learn that we should not be deceived about who God is and how he treats us.
The other kind of deception is even more devastating and that is when we deceive ourselves.
A person who deceives himself denies the truth in order to make it fit more comfortably into his or her lifestyle.
For example, a doctor knows very well that smoking is harmful to his health, but deceives himself into thinking that it won’t harm him.
In Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the queen asks, “mirror, mirror on the wall, whose the fairest of them all.”
She was self deceived, thinking that she was.
When she found out that wasn’t the truth, it caused a major upheaval in her world.
Being self-deceived can be very devastating.
A person who is deceived because they do not know the truth can be changed by presenting the truth, but what do you do with a person who knows the truth, but has distorted it?
One person says, “two things for which there are no antidotes are self-righteousness and self deception.
Both are terminal diseases.”
Today we will be warned not to deceive ourselves about our spiritual life.
As we listen to these challenging words on being deceived about some basic issues of the Christian life, we need to take note of the tone with which these things are written.
James says twice in this passage, “my beloved brothers.”
He writes with a heart of compassion as a pastor who is concerned for the spiritual well being of his people.
We need to listen as people who are loved.
!
I. Don’t Be Deceived About God 1:13-18
Last week we talked about trials.
We defined trials as those things that come into our life which challenge our faith.
The reality about trials is that they raise the possibility that we will not come through them with flying colours, but may give in.
Last week we said that we should face trials with joy because of the value they have in our life.
Because of that kind of thinking, we may think that God has brought these things into our life.
When trials come, we often ask, “why did God let this happen?”
or “why did God bring this into my life?”
However, you will notice that at no time did we discuss what the source of those trials was.
The text never says that God brings these things into our life.
How then should we think about where trials come from and what God’s role is?
!! A. God Does Not Tempt
One thing we can know for certain, as we learn in 1:13, is that, “When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.”
For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone…” The word “tempt” is the same Greek word as “trials” in verse 2 and 12. Which tells us that the same context is in mind.
The word is translated differently because the intent is different.
Trials have the purpose of revealing the quality of faith in us.
God may permit those, but we need to be very clear and not be deceived into thinking that God has any evil intent in any trial or temptation that may come into our life.
James makes it very clear that God is not capable of tempting us.
He is, as one commentary puts it, “impervious to evil” and he does not tempt anyone.
If evil happens because of a trial we are going through, we can in no way blame God.
God is incapable of doing evil or enticing anyone to do evil.
The lie that God brings evil into anyone’s life is as old as the garden of Eden where the serpent seduced Eve to consider the possibility that “God did not have her best interest in mind.”
To this kind of thinking, James says in 1:16 - “Don’t be deceived.”
To think that God has tempted us to do wrong is very dangerous thinking.
If God brought it into our life, then in some way, we can blame God for it and we don’t have to feel responsible for the outcome.
If God is responsible, then it diminishes our trust in Him and we begin to think that we need to rely on ourselves because God seems to be playing with us.
If God has brought this into our life, then we begin to question whether God has our best in mind and we wonder whether we can look to him.
As an aside to make sure that we do understand the source of sin, James lets us know where sin does come from.
If we can’t blame God, who can we blame?
A number of years ago, a comedian often used the phrase “The devil made me do it.”
James, however, puts the blame squarely on us.
We deceive ourselves when we think that the source of wrongdoing is anywhere else.
We deceive ourselves about these things because we don’t want to hear that we are responsible for our own sin.
“James has ignored the tempter without by focusing on the traitor within.”
The descriptions are vivid and powerful.
When going fishing, one of the main ways of catching fish is with the use of a lure.
(bring a lure).
The fish sees it and finds it attractive and wants it and chases it and bites it and is caught.
On Thursday, a black bear was sighted in Winnipeg.
You may have seen that they were trying to catch the bear by enticing him into a trap with sardine oil.
These are the pictures behind the two words, “dragged away” and “enticed.”
Sin happens when our own desires draw us into something good that is distorted and we become trapped or caught.
The imagery changes from fishing or hunting imagery to sexual language.
Desire is conceived and gives birth to sin and when sin is full grown it gives birth to death.
In The Message it says in verses 14,15, “We have no one to blame but the leering, seducing flare-up of our own lust.
Lust gets pregnant, and has a baby: sin! Sin grows up to adulthood, and becomes a real killer.”
What a contrast from what we learned last week when we saw that trials which are endured result in life.
!! B. God Is Generous
Far from being the source of temptation, God is the source of everything good.
Verse 16 being between vs. 15, 17 is really a transition and pertains to both concepts.
Don’t be deceived about God - He does not do anything to lead us into evil of any kind, instead, God does good to us.
Since God does not send the test to bring evil, what does God send?
He sends every good and perfect gift.
He is the Father of the heavenly lights.
The imagery of lights reminds us of the lights that we know on earth.
We know the light of the sun, but every night, the sun is gone and we are in the shadow of the earth.
From time to time, the moon comes between the earth and the sun and an eclipse causes a shadow to pass over the earth.
Every source of light can be uncertain or cast a shadow, but the light of God is pure and perfect.
There is no shadow in God.
There is no eclipse in the goodness of God.
There is no place where he does what is wrong.
The greatest example of that is the great gift of new birth which he has already given us.
He has chosen us, given us a new birth and created us as the firstfruits of his creation.
The blessing of salvation is the greatest demonstration that God has nothing but our best interest in mind.
So we need to be very careful that we are not deceived.
God does not bring evil to us but has our best interest in mind.
If we believe the lie, it leads to death.
Instead of being deceived, let us recognize God’s goodness and trust Him in every situation.
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