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James 4 NKJV
13 Come now, you who say,
“Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy
and sell, and make a profit”;
14 whereas you do not know
what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a
vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.
15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.”
The
Apostle-Pastor James is not suggesting we should have no plans, only that we
should be ever conscious that our lives are hidden in and directed by the
divine will of God. Our thoughts and plans should be made with the utmost
consideration and reverence for God’s will and purpose for our lives. This was
not then, and is not now, the practice of most people. James is saying
Believers in Jesus should be different than most people.
·
A
plan without God is a godless plan.
·
A
journey without God is an ungodly journey.
· A decision without God is a dangerous decision.
Those who take life into their own hands, take it out of God’s.
God intends that we plan. He is the One Who admonishes us to plant seeds for a future harvest and to consider the ant who works in the summer so they may eat in the winter.
God wants us to dream and have hope for the future. His desire however is that we would dream the dreams He has for us and willingly submit to His plan and purpose for our lives.
The sad account of this world is that the far majority of people give God no consideration, no respect, and no credit for life. They choose what they choose because of how they feel or what they want for themselves. Seldom if ever do they bathe their decisions in prayer. Rather they bathe their decisions in their own calculations, their fickle emotions, the opinions of friends, the pursuit of money, fame, or what imagine is the good life.
The scriptures plainly tell us that those who pursue money will fall into sin and will encounter many self-made sorrows. People often strive for and settle for what they consider visible security over having inner peace with God. There is no reason why a person cannot experience both. The only question is: Which one comes first?
There is no good life and no future without God. We cannot imagine that we will get ourselves ahead and get comfortable and get all we want or need and then we can serve the Lord with the remainder of our lives. This is the very thing the James wrote to us about:
James 4: 14 Whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.
How can we insure we aren’t fooling ourselves or being fooled by others?
The
world-model of life may not be God’s model your life. The world says:
·
Grow
up
·
Get
an education
·
Start
a career
·
Become
financially secure
·
Get
married
·
Have
2.1 children
·
Take
them to play soccer and learn dance
· So they can grow up and get an education and start a career and become financially secure and get married and have grandchildren for you to take to soccer and attend dance recitals in your retirement.
Where’s Jesus in all of this? It’s not where does He fit into my plan but rather, where do I fit into His plan?
I remember my life in the world. My life goals were to have a three-bedroom house with a two car garage, a boat and a pickup truck with a Remington 870 shotgun, a family dog, with weekends off, something barbecuing on the grill and an ice chest full of beer … friends were optional.
But something happened to me! Jesus happened to me! And now …
Now I have given away houses, boats, pickups, Remington 870’s, and several well-trained dogs; I work every weekend and have given away so many BBQ grills, my refrigerators have non-alcoholic beer in them now, and I have so many close friends all over the world that I have a hard time counting them all.
My life went from “me” centered to “He” centered. The constant consideration is: “What does He want?”
Let me tell you how it happened to me as we go to our text for today found in the Gospel of John, chapter 4.
John 4 gives us an account of Jesus passing through some territory that was known to be disagreeable towards Jews. I’ve been there a few times myself and those people are still angry and opinionated.
The contention between the people who lived in Samaria and the Jews was centered around where a person should worship. The Samaritans believed Mount Gerizim in Samaria was the place chosen by God while the Jews believed it was Mount Moriah in Jerusalem. This was no small disagreement and both groups pointed to scriptures in the Bible to back up their claim. They had the Word but still something was missing.
It was just like my life at one point. I had the truth, I even knew the scriptures and could quote them, but something was missing.
When Jesus arrived at Jacob’s well in Samaria, He met a woman who was coming to draw water. She had a sorted past and everyone in the town knew she was not the picture of purity. This woman had been married 5 times and was currently living with some other woman’s husband. No wonder she had to come to draw water at a time of the day when no one else was at the well.
Knowing all of this and yet caring for the woman, Jesus struck up a conversation with her. She was surprised to see a Jew was willing to talk to a Samaritan. Jesus had a plan … He knew she knew the scriptures, but He also knew exactly what she was missing.
When the Samaritan woman at the well asked Jesus the divisive question concerning where He thought a person should worship God, Jesus replied:
John 4 NKJV
22 “You worship what you do
not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.
23 “But the hour is coming,
and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and
truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him.
24 “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
Spirit and Truth!
God is seeking those who will worship Him in Spirit and in Truth, not just in one or the other.
This
woman had the truth in that she knew what Moses said, but she didn’t know what
it meant. It’s like what I heard John Ruttkay say in a recent podcast:
·
The
Spirit without the Truth, you’ll blow up.
·
The
Truth without the Spirit, you’ll dry up.
· The Spirit and the Truth, you’ll grow up.
This is what happened to me. It is exactly what happened to the woman at the well. I had the truth in that I knew the scriptures and had my reasons and felt justified in living my life and pursuing my desires, and doing what I wanted trying to make me happy and make my dreams come true. Yet something was missing.
This woman a the well changed in response to a prophetic word that went past what she knew and past her arguments and past her protective doctrines and struck her heart. It was the touch of the Holy Spirit, something she has never encountered before. It changed her life.
The Holy Spirit changed my life. Something powerful got hold of me. Something broke through the shell I had around my life that made it ok for me to do what I wanted and to pursue life as I thought I wanted it.
I wasn’t living in sin, I was living in self.
I had no thought whatsoever that what I wanted might not be what God wanted. I wrongly imagined that knowing the Word was enough. Don’t misunderstand me. The Word of God is the power of salvation. I was saved for sure, but I was not submitted. What if what I wanted was just that?
Not that I was being rebellious, I just didn’t know what I didn’t know and I had never had that life-changing encounter with the Holy Spirit that rushes through you, cleansing your heart and mind, opening up new pathways of thought, and connecting you with God in such a way that you feel like that burning bush God spoke through in the desert, on fire and yet not consumed. We all need a life-changing encounter with God after we’re saved.
I challenge you to open you heart to the life changing miracles of God through the power of the Holy Spirit. You shall receive this power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you and it will change your life to a “He” driven life instead of a “me” driven life. What does He want?
We know what we worship, Jesus said. God is seeking people today who will worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. You life is but a vapor, don’t take it into your own hands and out of God’s. Without the leadership of the Holy Spirit, the decisions you make for yourself are ungodly at best and downright dangerous at worst … even if you are born again.
James was talking to Believers in Jesus; people who knew the truth. Don’t leave the Holy Spirit and the perfect will of God out of the equation of life.
Your best future will be found in the perfect will of God for your life … and only God knows what that is until He chooses to reveal it to you. Bathe every decision in prayer and worship God in Spirit and in Truth!
You
are in this world, but you are not of this world.
