James 3:13-18
James is talking about two kinds of wisdom here. And the contrast is really stark in the words he uses. But, when you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your heart, does it show up and look that bad on the outside? So, I humorously entitled my message, is it Disney or is it Divine. Because the Disney stories actually exemplify this worldly wisdom. Take for example poor little Ariel, Disney’s Little Mermaid, feeling abused by her father and misunderstood just because she thinks she loves a human from above the waves. She is portrayed sympathetically as someone who ought to be allowed to follow her dreams, it is only her frustration and her determined ambition to get what she wants, no matter what, that has led to the tragic choice of taking advice from a sea witch because her father refused to help or even listen.
Everything turns out all right in the end, but not because Ariel truly repents. Rather, she wins the battle against evil once she realizes she has been deceived. And then her impressed father relents, and grants her request once he thinks he has been a fool for not listening to her earlier. Almost all of Disney’s plot lines go like that.
Another one is Thumbelina. There is a song in that movie that has these words. “You can do impossible things if you follow your heart.” That contrasts sharply with Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. And Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”
In Aladdin, the young man decides that if he wants to marry the princess, he can’t be himself but must pretend to be a prince. How lucky for him that he has a magic lamp and a genie to grant his wish! His selfish ambition in that regard results in a royal mess. But everything turns out all right in the end, even though he only repented of his ruse after he was caught. Besides that, his wits and ingenuity show him to be good and wise at heart, in a worldly sort of way. So he deserved to win and the evil vizier got what he deserved too.
But what if these characters had been led by godly wisdom? Would it still make a good story? Let’s see. Ariel accepts her father’s limits and does not selfishly seek out the sea witch. Nothing happens? No story? Well. What if Ariel and her father continue to have conversations about humans and mermaids. Ariel learns why her father has a deep-seated prejudice against the humans. Along the way, King Titan begins to wonder if his prejudice needs some rethinking.
As for the action, the sea witch still makes her bid to take over the kingdom and her effort is thwarted by the intervention of the human Prince Eric. King Titan realizes that his people have long misunderstood the humans and feared them all, when only some were evil in an event long past. You could still get a great story out of that!
How about Thumbelina? That’s an easy one, change the song to seek after God’s heart. Use this verse, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Then let the events of the story unfold in pretty much the same way as in the movie, but giving the glory to God for the rescue of the prince and the happy ending.
As for Aladdin, we turn him into an honest young man who’s first wish is to set the genie free and ask for no more. The genie, out of profound gratitude, is moved to inquire about the young man’s reasons and hears a proclamation of the gospel. Then they work together to remove the evil vizier. This success legitimately opens the door for him to marry the princess and his actions have opened her heart to him. You could make a great story out of that!
Now I am not saying don’t watch the Disney movies. They are funny and there are still some good moral points in them. Just not the full gospel. But what can you expect? And now, what about your life and mine? We are each living in a drama that unfolds as our own wills interact with circumstances and God’s sovereignty. Is the gospel at work there? There might not be magic. But prayers work wonders. And Godly wisdom leads to better things than earthly wisdom ever can.
Just think of an incident in your own life where you got really angry about what was going on. What if you could have a redo? Would that make a good story? I’m thinking of one of my own that could have turned out a whole lot better. This was quite a few years ago now when my youngest was still just around ten years old. It was night and it was time for bed. He had been told lights out. From upstairs I looked out the back window and it looked like the light from his bedroom window was still shining into the yard.
I snuck down the stairs to catch him. But he must have heard me coming because by the time I got there his light was out. Oh well. But when I went back upstairs and looked out the window again, his light was on again! This time I stormed down the stairs all furious about his rebellion. I’m sorry to have to confess that I really yelled at him for that. But he acted like I was totally out of my mind, that his light had been off for a while already and he complained that I woke him out of a dead sleep! Well, such lies didn’t help the situation. In my angry tone of voice, I shared a few more wise words about his disrespect and the likely consequences.
I was already a little embarrassed that I hadn’t maintained better control, but what do you think happened when I looked out the upstairs window again, saw the light on again and was just about to turn and go back down and really lay into that boy, when my daughter walked out of the upstairs bathroom and turned that light off, and the light went out on the back lawn at the same exact moment? Everything Caleb had said to me was true! I may have seriously traumatized him. I immediately went back downstairs in a much more humble manner to apologize. But as I said last week, smoothing it over takes a lot more work and effort.
I’m not proud of that story. But I do believe it is a common sort of experience among us humans when we jump to our own conclusions too quickly and don’t pray for wisdom. Anybody else here ever embarrassed themselves like that? You don’t have to share now. I shared me story only to emphasize how much we all need God’s grace and none of us should have to pretend that we never make mistakes or have to always wear a mask of perfection. In fact, I believe it is that selfish ambition kind of thinking that leads us to conclude that it is wiser to maintain the appearance of perfection, rather than be honest and confessional with each other.
In another story, I recently listened to a grieving father tell his story about how he lost his son in a tragic motorcycle accident. This father really wasn’t into church and the loss of his son did not make him turn to the Lord, rather away. What’s more, he was divorced and knew that God does not approve of such things. He turned away from God. And yet as time went on, the man fell in love again and this particular woman, his new wife, encouraged him to return to church. He did, probably mostly for her.
Ten years after the loss of his son, the pastor of the church he is now attending overhears this man in a conversation about how he lost his son, and how the way things were between them, he did not know whether his son went to heaven as a believer. That wondering was a great sorrow. A couple of days later, the pastor had a chance to speak with the man and asked a few more details about the location and date of the accident.
Now these two men had been acquainted for a very long time, but the man rarely spoke of his son. It was too painful for him. But as the pastor got additional details, he suddenly announced, “I was there! I saw the accident and I pulled over to see if I could help the young man. He was too severely injured to survive long, but we talked and I prayed with him. I can tell you that he professed his faith in Christ and is in heaven. I never did find out who he was. But when I heard you talking about him, it finally connected.”
So, after ten years, the man is comforted by that knowledge. Isn’t that a great story? But it is a great story because the man who lost his son also found his Heavenly Father, who put him in the right place, at the right time so that he could learn about his son’s fate and be comforted. The man didn’t earn that or accomplish it by his own wisdom, but it was done for him by the wisdom that comes from above in the grace of God.
All of us are in the middle of the stories of our lives. But that doesn’t mean we are the center of the universe, except that God treats each one if us as if we are in fact the center of his universe. You are the apple of his eye. You are not some no account, unnoticed, nobody who would not be missed much if you simply disappeared. God is crazy about you and you mean the world to him. He loves you so much that he would literally die for you even if you were the only one who needed it. And that’s exactly what he did do! He died for each and every individual who needed it. And that means everybody who ever lived! He didn’t die for a principle or for religious reasons or for an impersonal cause. He died for you. And, of course, for me.
The result is that each and every one of us is given an opportunity to respond to God by loving him back and believing that he can be with you personally and wants to have you for his very own. Faith in that is what keeps you in the Bible and in prayer. It is not religious duty. It is only to be with him! Our Christian life is lived out of a genuine response to experiencing that grace for yourself. There’s a song I really like in which some of the words are about becoming a Christian. He says, “It’s more like falling in love than something to believe in. It’s more like losing my heart than giving my allegiance.”
When James lays out these two kinds of wisdom, he doesn’t mean that we can just choose for ourselves the one we like better and that one of the two comes with his recommendation as the better choice. He is really talking about the difference between living as a saved Christian filled with the Holy Spirit and living as an unsaved religious person doing the best you can to earn God’s favor. That’s the ultimate selfish ambition!
Let’s go back through the text to see what he means. “Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom.” This is reflecting on the section we looked at last week. Your faith is shown by what you do. Your wisdom also is displayed in what you do. So, live a good life of good deeds done in humility and everyone will know that you are wise and understanding. But that kind of life is really only possible for those who know Jesus Christ personally by faith in him that is based on his word, in line with his word, and experienced by the personal encounter with Christ in whatever form, that leads to your rebirth in Christ and being baptized in the Holy Spirit.
James warns us, that no matter how religious you think you are, “if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.” And James is really saying that that kind of motivation is really not wise at all! It is evil.
One might think of the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. They were the religious leaders who carefully studied God’s Laws and the Prophets and diligently sought to live according to what they learned there. They thought they were wise! But Jesus is the one who said to them many things about how they were getting it wrong. They weren’t just misunderstanding it either. They were determined to believe that they got it right, and by keeping to their own thinking instead of letting God correct them through the words of Jesus, they ended up crucifying him as a blasphemer, when he was there to be their Savior!
But this trap is oh so subtle. Let me take you to the parable of the prodigal son. There is a story in which two young men were playing out the stories of their lives. The prodigal son, the one who squandered his inheritance in wild living, is obviously our portrayal of selfish ambition, right? He didn’t care about his father. He wanted his inheritance, which usually comes after the father dies. But this boy wanted it now. He basically said to his father, “I wish you were already dead.” And he went his own way, hit that dead-end road, repented and came home. He really experienced grace when his father ran to hug him and give him the best clothes and the big celebration of return and forgiveness, right? But had he earned that?
James says, “The wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive..” This repentant man coming home was first of all submissive. He decided to go and be a slave of his father. He became peace loving. He was not at peace in the distant land and he wasn’t going to go home and argue with his father to get more money. He was going to try to make peace with his father. But his life really changed once he learned how much his father loved him just for coming home! He never got a chance to show how sorry he was.
The loving Father just embraced his son as if he was coming home from a successful missionary trip and hadn’t done anything wrong at all. Really, the father just loved his son in a tremendous display of grace and mercy! What effect do you think that would have on the boy? I bet he would be more sorry than ever that he had ever left as it dawned on him that he had a much greater treasure in his living father than in any dead pile of money, no matter how large.
But then we turn to the older brother, the one who looks submissive because he stayed home, the one who looks peace loving because he didn’t argue with his father. And yet, this older brother is very angry with is dad and even puts it in terms of who gets his dad’s stuff. “He said, “I’ve worked for you all these years but you never gave me a party like this rebel is getting just for showing up!”
We get a look into his heart there. No peace. But the trap of selfish ambition has been holding him too. He was only working as a slave for his father so that he could earn his father’s inheritance more legitimately than just asking to take it, like his younger brother did. It would seem that he was on the better path to glory, but really it was just as selfish! He wasn’t doing it because he loved his Father or understood how much his father loved him. He was doing it to get what he wanted and did not believe that it was all his already as a gift from a loving Father!
And so it is with each of us. If we see ourselves as trying our best to be a good Christian because that is the way of salvation, then we are following Disney wisdom. We are like the older brother and likely to be full of resentment and bitterly angry when God seems to be doing great things in unfair generosity for other people who have wasted their lives in sin. But we have to hide that because we already know that James has said that “the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.” And we want to look good.
But what truly makes a good Christian is the God who has acted to shower his grace upon you, and you believe that, and all you are doing with the rest of your life is responding to such love. Those who have experienced such mercy find that they are truly able to show mercy to other people who don’t otherwise deserve it. They don’t earn your mercy, you are just full of mercy, just like God is. And the other characteristics of godly wisdom show up likewise. You don’t really choose them. They just kind of flow out of you, or through you.
As God fills you up with his good Spirit, the character of the Spirit, Godly character, shows up in your attitudes toward others and that shapes how you treat them. Selfish ambition disappears because you don’t have anything to strive for. Bitter envy disappears because you know that as a beloved child of God there is nothing more to envy. You already own everything that anyone could ever want because your Heavenly Father has it in store for you.
It is my prayer that every time I preach this gospel, it is not that I convince someone’s mind that it is better to act like a Christian. My goal is to touch someone’s heart so that they have an experience of God’s grace to respond to. Let everyone come to faith via the path of the prodigal son. Even if you have been a very nice religious person, please see that all of your righteousness is as filthy rags if you’re trying to be good enough. Turn and look at Christ on the cross. That horrible death is what you have earned. You didn’t earn Jesus taking your place. And Jesus didn’t earn or deserve that death. Your sins put him there!
And he stayed there because he loves you and you need his gift of salvation that is yours through believing that your sins are in fact that bad and horrible and that God in fact loves you enough to have died for you, and that Jesus died on that cross for your sins too.
Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation, experience his grace as the loving embrace of God who meets you on the road home and clothes you in the robe of his righteousness, though you are not even worthy to be his slave. By faith in Jesus, let the Holy Spirit fill you with the wisdom that comes from above. That is how you become a “Peacemaker who sows in peace to reap a harvest of righteousness.” What is that harvest? It is all the good works that God will do through you when you let him control your life by his wisdom as you love him back for his love for you. It is also all the people that you will play a role in leading to Christ as you follow Christ. Rejoice and believe the good news of the gospel of salvation!
The world’s false wisdom is expressed in just about any story or movie that is not written by a Christian. That’s why I chose Disney, those kid’s movies are not really just innocent stories teaching kids about the consequences of poor choices so that they make better choices. They are really saying, “Follow your heart and everything will turn our ok if you’re basically a good person.” That’s false! But that’s the best Disney can do.
The divine truth is quite the opposite. The Bible says, even to religious Pharisees and hypocrites, please realize and acknowledge that your sins are just as bad as everyone else’s. Nobody is basically good. Everybody is basically selfish and nothing is going to turn out ok unless you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation and live in response to God’s grace. So, look at your life again in this moment. Is it Disney or is it divine? Let us pray.
James is talking about two kinds of wisdom here. And the contrast is really stark in the words he uses. But, when you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your heart, does it show up and look that bad on the outside? So, I humorously entitled my message, is it Disney or is it Divine. Because the Disney stories actually exemplify this worldly wisdom. Take for example poor little Ariel, Disney’s Little Mermaid, feeling abused by her father and misunderstood just because she thinks she loves a human from above the waves. She is portrayed sympathetically as someone who ought to be allowed to follow her dreams, it is only her frustration and her determined ambition to get what she wants, no matter what, that has led to the tragic choice of taking advice from a sea witch because her father refused to help or even listen.
Everything turns out all right in the end, but not because Ariel truly repents. Rather, she wins the battle against evil once she realizes she has been deceived. And then her impressed father relents, and grants her request once he thinks he has been a fool for not listening to her earlier. Almost all of Disney’s plot lines go like that.
Another one is Thumbelina. There is a song in that movie that has these words. “You can do impossible things if you follow your heart.” That contrasts sharply with Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. And Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”
In Aladdin, the young man decides that if he wants to marry the princess, he can’t be himself but must pretend to be a prince. How lucky for him that he has a magic lamp and a genie to grant his wish! His selfish ambition in that regard results in a royal mess. But everything turns out all right in the end, even though he only repented of his ruse after he was caught. Besides that, his wits and ingenuity show him to be good and wise at heart, in a worldly sort of way. So he deserved to win and the evil vizier got what he deserved too.
But what if these characters had been led by godly wisdom? Would it still make a good story? Let’s see. Ariel accepts her father’s limits and does not selfishly seek out the sea witch. Nothing happens? No story? Well. What if Ariel and her father continue to have conversations about humans and mermaids. Ariel learns why her father has a deep-seated prejudice against the humans. Along the way, King Titan begins to wonder if his prejudice needs some rethinking.
As for the action, the sea witch still makes her bid to take over the kingdom and her effort is thwarted by the intervention of the human Prince Eric. King Titan realizes that his people have long misunderstood the humans and feared them all, when only some were evil in an event long past. You could still get a great story out of that!
How about Thumbelina? That’s an easy one, change the song to seek after God’s heart. Use this verse, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Then let the events of the story unfold in pretty much the same way as in the movie, but giving the glory to God for the rescue of the prince and the happy ending.
As for Aladdin, we turn him into an honest young man who’s first wish is to set the genie free and ask for no more. The genie, out of profound gratitude, is moved to inquire about the young man’s reasons and hears a proclamation of the gospel. Then they work together to remove the evil vizier. This success legitimately opens the door for him to marry the princess and his actions have opened her heart to him. You could make a great story out of that!
Now I am not saying don’t watch the Disney movies. They are funny and there are still some good moral points in them. Just not the full gospel. But what can you expect? And now, what about your life and mine? We are each living in a drama that unfolds as our own wills interact with circumstances and God’s sovereignty. Is the gospel at work there? There might not be magic. But prayers work wonders. And Godly wisdom leads to better things than earthly wisdom ever can.
Just think of an incident in your own life where you got really angry about what was going on. What if you could have a redo? Would that make a good story? I’m thinking of one of my own that could have turned out a whole lot better. This was quite a few years ago now when my youngest was still just around ten years old. It was night and it was time for bed. He had been told lights out. From upstairs I looked out the back window and it looked like the light from his bedroom window was still shining into the yard.
I snuck down the stairs to catch him. But he must have heard me coming because by the time I got there his light was out. Oh well. But when I went back upstairs and looked out the window again, his light was on again! This time I stormed down the stairs all furious about his rebellion. I’m sorry to have to confess that I really yelled at him for that. But he acted like I was totally out of my mind, that his light had been off for a while already and he complained that I woke him out of a dead sleep! Well, such lies didn’t help the situation. In my angry tone of voice, I shared a few more wise words about his disrespect and the likely consequences.
I was already a little embarrassed that I hadn’t maintained better control, but what do you think happened when I looked out the upstairs window again, saw the light on again and was just about to turn and go back down and really lay into that boy, when my daughter walked out of the upstairs bathroom and turned that light off, and the light went out on the back lawn at the same exact moment? Everything Caleb had said to me was true! I may have seriously traumatized him. I immediately went back downstairs in a much more humble manner to apologize. But as I said last week, smoothing it over takes a lot more work and effort.
I’m not proud of that story. But I do believe it is a common sort of experience among us humans when we jump to our own conclusions too quickly and don’t pray for wisdom. Anybody else here ever embarrassed themselves like that? You don’t have to share now. I shared me story only to emphasize how much we all need God’s grace and none of us should have to pretend that we never make mistakes or have to always wear a mask of perfection. In fact, I believe it is that selfish ambition kind of thinking that leads us to conclude that it is wiser to maintain the appearance of perfection, rather than be honest and confessional with each other.
In another story, I recently listened to a grieving father tell his story about how he lost his son in a tragic motorcycle accident. This father really wasn’t into church and the loss of his son did not make him turn to the Lord, rather away. What’s more, he was divorced and knew that God does not approve of such things. He turned away from God. And yet as time went on, the man fell in love again and this particular woman, his new wife, encouraged him to return to church. He did, probably mostly for her.
Ten years after the loss of his son, the pastor of the church he is now attending overhears this man in a conversation about how he lost his son, and how the way things were between them, he did not know whether his son went to heaven as a believer. That wondering was a great sorrow. A couple of days later, the pastor had a chance to speak with the man and asked a few more details about the location and date of the accident.
Now these two men had been acquainted for a very long time, but the man rarely spoke of his son. It was too painful for him. But as the pastor got additional details, he suddenly announced, “I was there! I saw the accident and I pulled over to see if I could help the young man. He was too severely injured to survive long, but we talked and I prayed with him. I can tell you that he professed his faith in Christ and is in heaven. I never did find out who he was. But when I heard you talking about him, it finally connected.”
So, after ten years, the man is comforted by that knowledge. Isn’t that a great story? But it is a great story because the man who lost his son also found his Heavenly Father, who put him in the right place, at the right time so that he could learn about his son’s fate and be comforted. The man didn’t earn that or accomplish it by his own wisdom, but it was done for him by the wisdom that comes from above in the grace of God.
All of us are in the middle of the stories of our lives. But that doesn’t mean we are the center of the universe, except that God treats each one if us as if we are in fact the center of his universe. You are the apple of his eye. You are not some no account, unnoticed, nobody who would not be missed much if you simply disappeared. God is crazy about you and you mean the world to him. He loves you so much that he would literally die for you even if you were the only one who needed it. And that’s exactly what he did do! He died for each and every individual who needed it. And that means everybody who ever lived! He didn’t die for a principle or for religious reasons or for an impersonal cause. He died for you. And, of course, for me.
The result is that each and every one of us is given an opportunity to respond to God by loving him back and believing that he can be with you personally and wants to have you for his very own. Faith in that is what keeps you in the Bible and in prayer. It is not religious duty. It is only to be with him! Our Christian life is lived out of a genuine response to experiencing that grace for yourself. There’s a song I really like in which some of the words are about becoming a Christian. He says, “It’s more like falling in love than something to believe in. It’s more like losing my heart than giving my allegiance.”
When James lays out these two kinds of wisdom, he doesn’t mean that we can just choose for ourselves the one we like better and that one of the two comes with his recommendation as the better choice. He is really talking about the difference between living as a saved Christian filled with the Holy Spirit and living as an unsaved religious person doing the best you can to earn God’s favor. That’s the ultimate selfish ambition!
Let’s go back through the text to see what he means. “Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom.” This is reflecting on the section we looked at last week. Your faith is shown by what you do. Your wisdom also is displayed in what you do. So, live a good life of good deeds done in humility and everyone will know that you are wise and understanding. But that kind of life is really only possible for those who know Jesus Christ personally by faith in him that is based on his word, in line with his word, and experienced by the personal encounter with Christ in whatever form, that leads to your rebirth in Christ and being baptized in the Holy Spirit.
James warns us, that no matter how religious you think you are, “if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.” And James is really saying that that kind of motivation is really not wise at all! It is evil.
One might think of the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. They were the religious leaders who carefully studied God’s Laws and the Prophets and diligently sought to live according to what they learned there. They thought they were wise! But Jesus is the one who said to them many things about how they were getting it wrong. They weren’t just misunderstanding it either. They were determined to believe that they got it right, and by keeping to their own thinking instead of letting God correct them through the words of Jesus, they ended up crucifying him as a blasphemer, when he was there to be their Savior!
But this trap is oh so subtle. Let me take you to the parable of the prodigal son. There is a story in which two young men were playing out the stories of their lives. The prodigal son, the one who squandered his inheritance in wild living, is obviously our portrayal of selfish ambition, right? He didn’t care about his father. He wanted his inheritance, which usually comes after the father dies. But this boy wanted it now. He basically said to his father, “I wish you were already dead.” And he went his own way, hit that dead-end road, repented and came home. He really experienced grace when his father ran to hug him and give him the best clothes and the big celebration of return and forgiveness, right? But had he earned that?
James says, “The wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive..” This repentant man coming home was first of all submissive. He decided to go and be a slave of his father. He became peace loving. He was not at peace in the distant land and he wasn’t going to go home and argue with his father to get more money. He was going to try to make peace with his father. But his life really changed once he learned how much his father loved him just for coming home! He never got a chance to show how sorry he was.
The loving Father just embraced his son as if he was coming home from a successful missionary trip and hadn’t done anything wrong at all. Really, the father just loved his son in a tremendous display of grace and mercy! What effect do you think that would have on the boy? I bet he would be more sorry than ever that he had ever left as it dawned on him that he had a much greater treasure in his living father than in any dead pile of money, no matter how large.
But then we turn to the older brother, the one who looks submissive because he stayed home, the one who looks peace loving because he didn’t argue with his father. And yet, this older brother is very angry with is dad and even puts it in terms of who gets his dad’s stuff. “He said, “I’ve worked for you all these years but you never gave me a party like this rebel is getting just for showing up!”
We get a look into his heart there. No peace. But the trap of selfish ambition has been holding him too. He was only working as a slave for his father so that he could earn his father’s inheritance more legitimately than just asking to take it, like his younger brother did. It would seem that he was on the better path to glory, but really it was just as selfish! He wasn’t doing it because he loved his Father or understood how much his father loved him. He was doing it to get what he wanted and did not believe that it was all his already as a gift from a loving Father!
And so it is with each of us. If we see ourselves as trying our best to be a good Christian because that is the way of salvation, then we are following Disney wisdom. We are like the older brother and likely to be full of resentment and bitterly angry when God seems to be doing great things in unfair generosity for other people who have wasted their lives in sin. But we have to hide that because we already know that James has said that “the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.” And we want to look good.
But what truly makes a good Christian is the God who has acted to shower his grace upon you, and you believe that, and all you are doing with the rest of your life is responding to such love. Those who have experienced such mercy find that they are truly able to show mercy to other people who don’t otherwise deserve it. They don’t earn your mercy, you are just full of mercy, just like God is. And the other characteristics of godly wisdom show up likewise. You don’t really choose them. They just kind of flow out of you, or through you.
As God fills you up with his good Spirit, the character of the Spirit, Godly character, shows up in your attitudes toward others and that shapes how you treat them. Selfish ambition disappears because you don’t have anything to strive for. Bitter envy disappears because you know that as a beloved child of God there is nothing more to envy. You already own everything that anyone could ever want because your Heavenly Father has it in store for you.
It is my prayer that every time I preach this gospel, it is not that I convince someone’s mind that it is better to act like a Christian. My goal is to touch someone’s heart so that they have an experience of God’s grace to respond to. Let everyone come to faith via the path of the prodigal son. Even if you have been a very nice religious person, please see that all of your righteousness is as filthy rags if you’re trying to be good enough. Turn and look at Christ on the cross. That horrible death is what you have earned. You didn’t earn Jesus taking your place. And Jesus didn’t earn or deserve that death. Your sins put him there!
And he stayed there because he loves you and you need his gift of salvation that is yours through believing that your sins are in fact that bad and horrible and that God in fact loves you enough to have died for you, and that Jesus died on that cross for your sins too.
Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation, experience his grace as the loving embrace of God who meets you on the road home and clothes you in the robe of his righteousness, though you are not even worthy to be his slave. By faith in Jesus, let the Holy Spirit fill you with the wisdom that comes from above. That is how you become a “Peacemaker who sows in peace to reap a harvest of righteousness.” What is that harvest? It is all the good works that God will do through you when you let him control your life by his wisdom as you love him back for his love for you. It is also all the people that you will play a role in leading to Christ as you follow Christ. Rejoice and believe the good news of the gospel of salvation!
The world’s false wisdom is expressed in just about any story or movie that is not written by a Christian. That’s why I chose Disney, those kid’s movies are not really just innocent stories teaching kids about the consequences of poor choices so that they make better choices. They are really saying, “Follow your heart and everything will turn our ok if you’re basically a good person.” That’s false! But that’s the best Disney can do.
The divine truth is quite the opposite. The Bible says, even to religious Pharisees and hypocrites, please realize and acknowledge that your sins are just as bad as everyone else’s. Nobody is basically good. Everybody is basically selfish and nothing is going to turn out ok unless you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation and live in response to God’s grace. So, look at your life again in this moment. Is it Disney or is it divine? Let us pray.
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