I want to explain to those who don’t know, what its like to be a Cardiff city fan. Each season begins with promise, and I feel a sense of expectation and excitement. For the first half of the season, I hope, and dream and see a bit of just what can be achieved with great people such as Andy Legg and Willlie Boland fighting for us. But the life of a soccer team is never easy, and there will always come a time of hardship, where we just don’t seem to be winning, or playing with any passion, or Andy gets injured, and doubts start to creep in. can we achieve promotion this season? Is it worth even turning up to support the boys? But I always trust that we will come good, and be there at the end.
And despite the trials of last season, I have confident assurance that we can do it this year. But I know it will take prayer, and commitment and sacrifice, and more prayer.
James 1v1-8
1James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ,
To the twelve tribes scattered among the nations:
Greetings.
2Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. 4Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 5If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. 6But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. 7That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; 8he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.
As far as I can remember, I’ve never enjoyed trials. So thankfully that’s not what James is asking us to do.
Trials are difficult, troublesome often confusing times, and quite frankly, are not nice.
But we have faith. Hebrews 11:1 (NLT) says ‘1What is faith? It is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot yet see.’
So faith is being sure that what we hope for will come about.
Trails test our faith. They make us question where our hope lies and teach to dig deep into the resources that God has provided for us.
Without trials, we would not be hoping for a better time, because we wouldn’t need it; we wouldn’t see the need to depend on God; we wouldn’t grow as Christians, and we wouldn’t have love and compassion for others.
So trials play a big part in developing us as Christians.
James says that through trials your faith develops perseverance, in other words, trials prove that we believe. Then this perseverance, or simple grit and determination, takes over, and allows faith to grow.
Increased faith gives us a spiritual maturity. It helps us to understand who Jesus is, and what he has done for us. It gives us a desire to want more of God, and to want to know more of him.
Imagine you get the one thing you have always wanted, as a gift. It comes through the post, wrapped carefully, and addressed to you personally. But it doesn’t say who sent it. The postage stamp says it comes from the other side of the world and you don’t know anyone there who could possibly know you, or know how much you wanted this gift. Wouldn’t you try to find out who it came from? Wouldn’t you feel a bit guilty, accepting such an amazing gift without knowing who to thank for it?
Surely it’s even more so with the gift that God has given us – eternal life. We know that it cost him dearly, we know that he did it to show his love to each of us personally, and that it cost him his Son. But do we really know who to thank? Do we really know who this giver is, well enough to be indifferent about the gift he has given? Through faith, we can learn more and more about who God is.
Faith leads to trials, trials lead to perseverance, perseverance leads to growth, growth leads to more trials. But if faith also leads to a deeper knowledge of God, then it also leads to the ability to express joy when we go through trials.
So when James talks about joy, he is telling us to see God in the situation. 1 Peter 4 says...
12Dear friends, don’t be surprised at the fiery trials you are going through, as if something strange were happening to you. 13Instead, be very glad--because these trials will make you partners with Christ in his suffering, and afterward you will have the wonderful joy of sharing his glory when it is displayed to all the world.
The joy that James speaks about isn’t a ‘I’m a Christian, I’m happy and nothings wrong’ joy, although, sometimes, we pretend that’s how it is. He isn’t saying we should enjoy our trials, just that we should have joy throughout them, and despite them.
It a joy that says I know I’m standing on solid ground, and although these troubles shake me, I will stand firm in God, because he loves me and wont let me go. It’s a joy in a Saviour who saves a Healer who heals, and a Lover that loves. In other words, in a God who keeps his promises. And sometimes our joy and our faith do just rest on hope. When all around us is falling apart, sometimes maybe we just hope that what we cannot see is still real.
Hope turns from just a thought, or a wish, to faith when we put our trust in that thing. So hoping that God will restore us is one thing, but by standing on that hope, we have faith. And through that faith, trusting that our hope is also truth, we are saved.
1 Peter 1:5-9 in the NLT says:
5And God, in his mighty power, will protect you until you receive this salvation, because you are trusting him. It will be revealed on the last day for all to see. 6So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though it is necessary for you to endure many trials for a while.
8You love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him, you trust him; and even now you are happy with a glorious, inexpressible joy. 9Your reward for trusting him will be the salvation of your souls.
But that is only half of the passage.
The other half says – what if we have this hope, and sometimes we put our trust in it, and other times we question it?
James says, when troubles come, we should ask for wisdom.
This wisdom enables us to stand on the truth that we have learnt about God.
Wisdom says that when we are in trouble, God is there. It is a knowledge given by God to assess a situation by its merit, using Gods judgement and not ours. Which is very useful. Because when trouble comes, we immediately panic. Confusion sets in, and we lose our focus. Wisdom pulls us back to that focus, which is God.
Note that James doesn’t suggest we ask for a way out of the trial, he suggests we ask for a way through it. We need wisdom just to say that what our eyes see isn’t all that there is. Wisdom isn’t a way of solving a problem; it’s a way of dealing with it.
This is the massive part that Scripture, meeting as Christians, prayer, worship and faith play in getting us through trials. You can’t ask for wisdom and have it turn up on your doorstep the next day. We find wisdom in the Bible, through the experiences and compassion of others, and through praising God.
But if we don’t ask for wisdom to be able to see God, where are we? You need to ask to receive. Otherwise doubt creeps in. If we hope, but place no faith in that hope, it’s just a thought, or a theory.
If we knew God in his completeness, then we would not doubt. Philip Yancey, in his book ‘Reaching the Invisible God’, says, ‘Doubt will always coexist with faith, for in the presence of certainty, who would need faith at all?’
But this doesn’t mean that it’s okay to keep doubting. Doubt should cause us to question, to dig deeper and find more out about God, as this enables us to mature. But doubt must not become a permanent condition. We should not allow it to grow, because doubt that is allowed to fester, leads to disbelief, and disbelief turns us away from God. That is why, when we want to explore our doubts, we must be careful where we look. There’s not point in looking for answers from non-Christians because they don’t have them, and will persuade us to try other things. Again, the places to find answers to our doubts are through Scripture, mature Christians, by recognising what God has done for us, and by worshipping Him.
Surely it is better to doubt out loud than to disbelieve in silence? I think this is where we as Christians can lose marks; desiring to be open and honest, we are scared to show our frailties to those inside the church who we feel may look down on us, or make us feel foolish. But I think that through growth groups and through Agapé generally growing as a family, people are feeling more at ease to ask questions, and through that, we can have a greater desire to want to know more of God and we feel more able to pursue that desire.
Take Thomas, Jesus’ disciple. In John 11, when Jesus tells his disciple that he is going to Judea to where Lazarus was, and the other disciples suggest that it would be too dangerous for Jesus to go back there, Thomas said, ‘Let us go, that we may die with him.’ This shows that Thomas had faith that Jesus was who he said he was. But Thomas was best known for questioning Christ’s resurrection. It was not the only time that he questioned, but he isn’t unusual by doubting God, he’s just human.
But we should follow Thomas’ example, and voice our doubts and our questions so that we can talk them through and use them to learn more about God.
How can we approach God with no doubt, like James instructs us to, given difficult circumstances and human frailties?
In Isaiah chapter 6, in which Isaiah tells us of his calling, when he comes to God’s throne and recognises His glory and majesty, Isaiah cries out,
"My destruction is sealed, for I am a sinful man and a member of a sinful race. Yet I have seen the King, the LORD Almighty!"
6Then one of the seraphim flew over to the altar, and he picked up a burning coal with a pair of tongs. 7He touched my lips with it and said, "See, this coal has touched your lips. Now your guilt is removed, and your sins are forgiven."
Through recognising who God is, approaching him humbly, and in an attitude of repentance; and also showing a willing heart to apply the answered prayer to our life, we have a belief that honours God.
God is there when we call on him. And we need faith to believe that he will hear and answer us.
Surely everyone would sign up to Christianity if we had no trials, as it would be an easy ride through life. But we show the reality of God’s love for us because we have joy when life is at its worst. The object of a trial is specifically to test your Christian faith, and so prove it to be genuine.
James’ message is ‘Don’t put off your life of faith until times get better. Right now, in the midst of your suffering, is the exact time that your life in Christ should take over.’
God equips us to deal with trials. John 14:15-18 and 26-27 says
15"If you love me, you will obey what I command. 16And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever-- 17the Spirit of truth. 18I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you… the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. 27Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.
So to recap:
• Trials test our faith and we should use them to grow in our relationship with God.
• When we go through trials, our joy comes from standing firm on the promises that God has given to us, and we should pray, read Scripture, confide in our Christian friends and worship and praise God throughout our trials.
• Doubting out loud is safer than disbelieving in silence. We should use our doubts to learn more about God.
• It is through difficult times that our faith has the biggest part to play, and is able to grow.
• We show the reality of God’s love for us because we have joy when life is at its worst. The object of a trial is specifically to test your Christian faith, and so prove it to be genuine.
• Don’t put off your life of faith until times get better. Right now, in the midst of your suffering, is the exact time that your life in Christ should take over.
• We should approach God humbly and in an attitude of repentance and worship when we ask him for wisdom as God requires us to believe when we ask him for anything.
I’m going to read a few verses from James 5 and Micah 7 and then play a CD. Use this time just to seek God, and respond to what he has said to you today. If you need to speak to someone, or receive prayer, then take this opportunity now, and don’t leave it.
James 5
7Dear brothers and sisters,[2] you must be patient as you wait for the Lord’s return. Consider the farmers who eagerly look for the rains in the fall and in the spring. They patiently wait for the precious harvest to ripen. 8You, too, must be patient. And take courage, for the coming of the Lord is near. 13Are any among you suffering? They should keep on praying about it. And those who have reason to be thankful should continually sing praises to the Lord.
14Are any among you sick? They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord. 15And their prayer offered in faith will heal the sick, and the Lord will make them well. And anyone who has committed sins will be forgiven.
16Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and wonderful results. 17Elijah was as human as we are, and yet when he prayed earnestly that no rain would fall, none fell for the next three and a half years! 18Then he prayed for rain, and down it poured. The grass turned green, and the crops began to grow again.
Restore Wandering Believers
19My dear brothers and sisters, if anyone among you wanders away from the truth and is brought back again, 20you can be sure that the one who brings that person back will save that sinner from death and bring about the forgiveness of many sins.
Micah 7
7As for me, I look to the LORD for his help. I wait confidently for God to save me, and my God will certainly hear me. 8Do not gloat over me, my enemies! For though I fall, I will rise again. Though I sit in darkness, the LORD himself will be my light. 15"Yes," says the LORD, "I will do mighty miracles for you, like those I did when I rescued you from slavery in Egypt."
