Throat Punch | Week 4

So they sent me to my regular doctor for a follow-up and I was nervous going because my cholesterol I knew it was gonna be high because last year it was high and I hadn't done anything different.

What are the odds your cholesterol is gonna plummet for no reason? Come on, 200. Come on. Three thirty seven, how can that be? I had Burger King coupons in my pocket. It's inexplicable.

So I was nervous. And I realized that's the only time as an adult that I feel like a little kid. Because when I go to the doctor, you didn't do what I told you, did you? No. I'm not.

What should you have done? I should've listened when you were talking to me.

What are you gonna do from now on? Pay attention when you say things.

When are you gonna start? I'm gonna start right now. Really?

Gonna pay attention when you say things. Gonna start right now. That's funny. Brian Regan. I love him. He's he's hysterical. I think it now completes, if you've in this church very long,

that particular comedy special, that was now the last loop. I think I've showed every part of it at some point in a sermon illustration. So I gotta find something else. But no, I I love that he's talking about going to the doctor. Isn't it true how sometimes you go to a doctor and and you're nervous because you know, they told you, hey, here's what you need to do to be healthier, and you kinda didn't listen. Some of us, we listen to the doctor, but it's the dentist that we do that too. You know, like like we act like brushing my teeth for an extra ten minutes gonna make up for six months of not flossing. You know, it's like, it's not gonna work. And, but it's interesting because, know, the the doctor scares you that you're like, you know, you think you're in trouble and all that, but the reality is we we ignore what he says,

but he's really trying to help us. His goal is for us to be healthy. And and yet what we we don't listen because sometimes what he challenges us to do to be healthy isn't pleasant.

It it might seem difficult. It might seem hard. And that's really similar to to to to our our sermon series, and it's exactly what we're gonna be talking about today. Is is do we listen to God? And and even though he wants us to be healthy. Because we're in this series called Throat Punch.

If you're if you're new and it's it's through this book of James in the bible and the new testament. And it's a real throat punchy book. It's in in in in what do I mean by a throat punch? Is just by way of review, the definition here is a throat punch is a truth that may be painful,

but it actually awakens us from a false reality. So it's a truth that may feel painful. I mean, it's one of those truths that's like, know, the doctor. When you go to the doctor, one of the reasons why why

Brian Regan would say, hey, you know, didn't really change anything is because the doctor told everything you enjoy to eat, you need to stop eating. Dairy, gone. This, gone. He goes on and says happiness, gone. You know, and so sometimes

the throat punch, you hear something, this is how to be healthy, but it doesn't sound pleasant. But in the end,

it awakens you from a false reality. Like I can just keep going down this road and life's gonna be fine. Until you have a heart attack. It's kind of the same thing as that person that shoves you out of the way of a bus, but you didn't see the bus. So you thought why did he shove me? I wanted to cross the street, and then you realized the person just saved your life. That's really what we mean by throat punch, and that's really the book of James is full of that. There's a 108 verses in the book of James. 52 of them are commands. 52 of them are this is how to live life. 52 of them are this is how to to to to to actually be blessed.

And it's not about how to get God to love you.

As we read through the book of James or some things that think, well, so is is this really saying if I don't do this, God doesn't love me? No. This is not how to how to come into a relationship with the Lord. This is not how to to earn his love. Jesus died for us because he loves us. But if I have entered into a relationship with Jesus, this is like, here's how to live out that love.

This is how to truly experience life. And so we've been unpackaging these throat punches. And today is what I would say of all the throat punches, it sounds like the obvious, but it's also the most throat punchy. And it's simply this, don't just listen to God's word. Do what it says.

Because the Lord is like the great physician. He is the great physician. Just like a doctor. And when he challenges us, here's how you need to live. He's doing that because he loves us, and he wants us to be healthy.

But sometimes we struggle with that. We have our Burger King coupons of spirituality in our pocket and we struggle with listening. So buckle up because today's passage is is pretty challenging. And I'm just warning you because don't shoot the messenger. Okay?

So let's go ahead and open up to the book of James. We're in chapter one

and we're in verse 19 through the rest of the chapter. Next week we'll be in chapter two finally. And so I just wanna read this and then we'll go back and unpackage it. He says this, understand this my dear brothers and sisters. You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry.

Human anger does not produce the righteousness God desires. So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives and humbly accept the word of God has planted in your heart for it has the power to save your souls. But don't just listen to God's word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you're only fooling yourselves.

For if you listen to the world and don't obey, it's like glancing at your face in a mirror. You see yourself walk away and forget what you look like. But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don't forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.

If you claim to be religious but don't control your tongue, you're only fooling yourself, and your religion is worthless. Pure and genuine religion in the sight of the father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.

So there you go. So so so the challenge here, this whole section is about this idea of of we can't just listen to God's words, we need to apply God's words. Verse 22 is actually the theme of the whole section. Everything kind of orbits around it where it says don't just listen to God's word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you're only fooling yourselves.

So as as we look at it, he goes so he's unpacking this. He goes in the context of what we've already looked at. This is written to a group of of Christians that are being dispersed due to persecution,

and now they're having this temptation of instead of being really legalistic, do everything God says and that's how he gets us to love us. They realize it's all about the grace of God, which is great. But now that they're being persecuted, they're feeling like, you know what the safe route to do is?

I'll just believe in Jesus' love and then live my life however I want. And you know, it's about grace. That way I might not get persecuted. And that's why the book opened up the first week about dealing with problems. That if you follow the Lord, there is gonna be some tough times. He

and but don't worry. If you trust him, you're gonna get where he wants you to go. And then we unpackaged that, and then out of that came good decision making, because when we have problems, sometimes we're tempted to make the worst decisions ever. And then out of that we looked at temptation and dealing with that. And out of now this kind of sums up this whole first chapter when it says what it really was building towards is, here's the real problem.

We got to be a people if we know the Lord that we need to listen to what he says and actually do it. Not just listen to the word, but live it out. If you want, as it says in the end passage, if you do it, you'll be blessed by God for doing so. And that word for blessed means truly happy.

Go back to the hashtag blessed series and it I already defined that whole thing. It's a it's a it's a happiness of depth and distance. It's not short lived. It's it's it's a real happiness. It's what we're really looking for. So in other words, he's saying if you listen to me, you're gonna get what you really want out of life, what you were built to get,

instead of all the cheap other ways you're trying to get it. But you have to listen to what I say. So in here there's there's it's kind of broken down that he gives two examples, two illustrations,

and then the last thing is he kind of says, and this is what it really looks like then. If you're gonna put this together, this is what your life should look like. And and so as we break that apart, I think there's it's saying that there's basically three things that we need to do. If we're gonna actually allow God's word. If we're gonna be the section I'd call be blessed by the Bible. If we're really gonna be blessed by God's word, there's there's three three things that it says here we we gotta be willing to do. And the first one is simply this, is we need to receive God's word.

Usually we need to receive God's word, we need to reflect on God's word, and we need to respond to God's word. But the first thing is you gotta receive God's word. That's in these first few verses.

It's Israel. I'm gonna read it backwards because because it says here it starts off verse 21. It says, so get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives and humbly accept the word God has planted in your heart for it has the power to save.

So he he starts off and it's kind of reversed. The verse 21 is saying what we should do because our problem is verse nineteen and twenty is what we end up doing. If we don't do verse 21, we're gonna act like verse nineteen and twenty.

And and so what did he says? He says the first thing you need to do is is to humbly accept.

That's the key thing. If you have your bibles you like to underline underline that because the first thing is it needs to be humble. You're not gonna receive God's word. You're not gonna be receptive to God's word. You're not gonna accept it in your life if you're not humble.

You're gonna think you know more than God. You think you know more in everything. You're just you're you're not gonna humble yourself and realize that you're not gonna say, I'm not God.

And and so the first thing is you gotta have the humility. But then humility to what? It says to accept. The reason I wrote it received is because that word for accept is an interesting word. It it means to welcome in. It's it's a word used of like it like like someone comes to your house

and and you welcome them in. They ring the doorbell

and and you know we are different levels of welcoming depending on who rings the doorbell, aren't we? You know if it's someone you love and care about and you know you haven't someone in your family haven't seen in a long time they ring. They don't even usually get the doorbell ring. You see the car pull up, like,

come on in. But if it's those those those those two guys in the white shirts, and and you see them, and you're like, oh, no. And and or a salesperson

or or or or or something, you'll you'll do what I do. I I I I will sometimes like, oh, I don't want it. Do they see me? Because I the house we moved from had a had a window in the door and we never got a window shade on it, So you could always look in. And the problem is you came right into it. We had basically a great room. And and so the the one half of the the house where the TV and stuff was only separated from a wall about this tall. And I've had the mistake of of of there's nowhere you can hide really.

If someone rings the doorbell, they're looking in. And there's been a time like, I started to get up out of a chair and someone rang the doorbell. Right? And I look, I get eye contact. And like, what do I do? So I would actually drop down. I'd go back down. I'd be crawling

to the edge, and I'm looking around. Oh, no. I don't know what's going on. And then, you know, you kinda you sneak up and look and see, like, did they see me? And then one time, the guy's standing there, he looked at me, like, I know you're there. And I go, I don't care.

I don't care. How long do I have to stay down here before he realizes I'm not gonna answer the door?

And you know what? And this is what we this is what it means to be are is this how we are with God's word? Is that how we welcome God's word? Are we like, God, I'm on my knees. Hiding from your word because I don't wanna listen. Sometimes we just four services?

Sad when I'm gonna get too old to do that. That's it means are you welcoming it in or do you kind of welcome some of it in but want to hide from the rest? I mean, we're in our new house. My my son was home alone

last week, and he doesn't like being home alone. I mean, he's a brave big kid, but he doesn't like it when he's home alone. And somebody came to the door and kept ringing the doorbell.

And and they stopped, and then they kept knocking, and they ring. It's like I think they saw him upstairs. They knew someone was at house and the sales he wouldn't go away.

So finally, my son's like, oh, this is bothering me. So he walked downstairs, walked right up to the door. The guy's looking at it, locked it, and then turned around and left.

That is categorized as unwelcoming. I feel like what some of us do I'm tempted to that someday. Sometimes I'm like, oh, I'm totally welcoming to God's word Until it's something that actually hits up against something that I have a problem with. Like it's it's it's it's something I'm afraid of.

If God's word hits against one of your fears, one of your pains, one of your own struggles, You know what we're tempted to do? To not be welcoming. And that's what it's saying right here. And when we don't get welcoming, we do what verse nineteen and twenty says. It says, understand this.

You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry. Human anger does not produce the righteousness God desires. You realize what it's saying is, when God's word wants to come into your life, if I don't have a receptive heart, and he's using farming

illustration here. He's actually kind of almost inferring the whole parable of this the seed that that that that Jesus taught was where God's word is seed and and and the soil is our hearts.

It's the same seed, but why does one grow into something and one go nowhere? It's not a problem with the seed, it's a problem with the soil. Are you receptive? Are you accepting? Are you welcoming in to God's word? Because if you're not, you're gonna have a problem. And what he's saying is, the reason we struggle with that is if it hits against something I don't like, and I'm not humble,

I will start not listening, talking a whole lot, and getting angry.

You might have heard this passage preached on how to have a good marriage or something. It's good advice. Whenever you're in any relationship you should listen more than you talk, and don't get angry. Don't try to force away. That's great advice, but that's not what this passage is talking about in this spot. It's actually referring to

God's word in your life. And when I struggle with that and I'm not humble, when it tries to come in and ring the doorbell, I'll lock the door to him. He keeps ringing the doorbell, we get angry. We get defensive. You know what it's saying is most of the time when I hear something from God's word I don't like,

and if I'm not humble or broken or stranded, I'm not receptive to it, I'm not welcoming it in, I'm gonna get a defensive heart. And you know what? You know the the best defense is a good offense, which I really wish the Cardinals would figure this out. And so we get on the offense. We stop listening and we start talking.

What he's saying is we make excuses. We argue. We get angry. We get angry at God. Well if he wants me to do that why did he give me this situation? If he wants that why if God's so great why did he allow this? We argue with the people around us.

You you know, that's why I said don't shoot the messenger. One of the key things is we we usually most of us that know the Lord don't want to argue with God, but if I challenge you with something that's clearly in God's word, you'll find a reason to take it up with me. And we get angry,

And he says human anger doesn't get anywhere. So if you want to be receptive,

the first thing he says here that's interesting is he tells you how. How do I start to become receptive? He goes get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives. Now you would think that's saying, oh, so how you'd be receptive to God's word on how it wants to change you is you better be perfect then it'll be okay. That's not what it's talking about. The evil it's mentioning is the things that'll distract you,

but the key word is the first thing, the filth. You think that's just talking about moral stuff. The Greek word for filth, you know what it means? Earwax. Earwax. Kinda gross. Ear wax. That's what it's saying. Get rid of the ear wax that's blocking your ability to really hear what God is saying

and allowing the evil to control you. So the idea is you gotta get rid of the earwax. You gotta unblock and it has to be I have to decide. I gotta say I'm gonna unlock the door and I'm gonna welcome God's word in. When you come here on the weekend, do you come here with a prepared heart saying,

I can't wait to hear the Holy Spirit challenge me. Or do you come here going, you know I hope it's like it's marginally entertaining or a lot of us do, I hope I find out some new Bible information. If you come thinking learning Bible information is maturity, there's earwax.

Because maturity isn't about information, it's about transformation. Now of course you need information to have transformation, but that's what he's saying is don't just listen. Listen as you get the information. Transformation is you apply it to your lives.

So when you come, do you come with a prepared heart? I'm gonna welcome even if it scares the snot out of me. I'm gonna welcome the Holy Spirit to come in and through his word, challenge me. That's what it's saying to do.

Now how it challenges you is the next thing it says you need to. Not only do I need to receive it, I need to reflect on it. I need to spend time. In other words, I don't just need to go through the word of God, I need to allow the word of God to go through me. And that's what he transfers into another illustration.

When he comes at it from a different angle when he goes first he says, don't just listen to God's word. I'll come back to that. But in verse 23 he says, for if you listen to the word and don't obey, it's like glancing at your face in a mirror. You you see yourself, walk away, and you forget what you look like.

But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don't forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it. So see now he transfers from this farming illustration to a mirrors illustration.

See, we gotta have a receptive heart, but we also gotta understand that the word of God is like a mirror. And why do we use mirrors? What are mirrors to do? They reflect what's happening on the outside. Right? And that's what he's saying. Well, the word of God reflects what's happening on our insides.

And and and just like our actual mirror, you should do the same thing for your insides. You should let God's word reflect back so you can see what's going on. And what you need to do, what do you do when you have a mirror? I mean, how many of you looked at a mirror when you were getting ready to come over here today?

Alright. Those of you that didn't raise your hand, it's obvious. Probably should have. I'm just kidding. You just didn't wanna raise your hand. No. There there's a reason we have mirrors.

I mean, some of us you like to stare at mirrors, know, in the gym people, know, stuff like that. But the real use of a mirror is to go, hey, is there a booger in my nose? Is there something in my teeth? Is there did I comb my hair? I mean, we we have a mirror in our downstairs right before you walk out. It's more for aesthetic look is a cool place, but it's been very helpful because the last thing you see before you walk out is this full length mirror. You know, anytime I walk down and goes, oh, man, I I

didn't comb my hair or I didn't put a belt on or I'm not wearing pants, you know. There's always something

that I forgot. And and it's like it's good to check before you go out into the world. And I can't I my wife's not always there to say, you're gonna wear that in the public? I mean, that's always helpful, but I don't have that. So

so that that that's what a mirror is. It's it's a chance to to to look. And and it says you should look intently. Think about it. It says do would somebody look into a mirror, see what's going on,

and then walk away. If you're about to go to something really important, would you stare in the mirror and go, man, I got a big goop of stuff on my teeth here. You know, okay. And then leave and go anyways. First date, it'll be alright.

You know, you wouldn't do that. That's what he's saying is why would you sit there and and see, and then walk away and forget about it. Says we we we need to remember that that that we need to be willing to reflect, look intently into the mirror.

And really what God wants to show us in our life is like one of the most important times. Have you ever thought about the most important things you're going to? You probably spend the most time in front of the mirror, don't you? You know, you're you're we need to spend time in front of the mirror.

That's why I say you need to be in the Word of God other than on the weekends. You need to be willing to to to to get there and look at it, and let it look at you really. A mirror is letting it you look at you, and that takes time. Are you willing to reflect on God's Word?

And another one of the best ways is do it with other people, because sometimes other people are the best mirror. And and so that's why I'm always challenging us to do this. And you know it's weird, it's maybe it's just me, maybe I'm the only guy like this, but I think I'm a pretty normal average guy.

And I struggle the same thing that most guys do. You know study after study shows that guys that go to church that you know, say they know Jesus, on average read their Bible less than the women. And we act like we're more we're busier. Have you seen how busy moms are? And how many these moms work?

I go, we act like it's our busy lifestyle, but it's really not. The women are not any less busy than you and I. That's an excuse. If you're like me, which I think you are, it's my struggle sometimes where I avoid reflecting on God's word is, I'm afraid of what I'm gonna see.

And guys we're wired with an ego that we just don't like seeing it. We don't like to see, so we act like we act like Queen Elizabeth the first. The first Queen Elizabeth back in like the fifteen hundreds.

She was apparently beautiful when she was younger, but as she aged she did not like the way she looked. So her answer was she had every mirror taken out of Buckingham Palace. She removed all the mirrors. So her answer to not liking what she saw was I'm not gonna look. And could that be? Guys, especially. Girls too.

But speaking to my people that I know my heart as a man, be honest. Could that be the reason you're not in the word? Could that be the reason you don't want community with other people, other guys? Because you're more afraid of the failure of what you're gonna see. But here's the thing, every time these throw punches,

why is God challenging us to listen? Because He's angry and mean, or because He is the great physician that wants to bring healing and life to us? You don't have to be afraid of it. You got to be willing to reflect. So coming in here, where's your heart right now? Do you come here receptive to God's Word?

And are you willing to reflect on God's Word? Let it speak to you. Because ultimately that's the the the heart of what you need to do. If you're gonna be able to respond to God's word, you gotta receive it, you gotta reflect on it, and and that's really what comes down to last thing is you gotta respond to God's word.

Back up to verse 22 here when it says, don't just listen to God's word, you must do what it says. Otherwise, you're only fooling yourself. You know what's crazy is that word for listen. It's a Greek word that's auditory. It's where we get the word auditory from. It's sound.

So it's kinda like this idea that like between listening and doing. When we say did you hear me, we kinda mean two different things. And you know you mean two things like, hey, you're not listening to me. And usually when you say someone's not listening to marriage, you're not he's not listening to me. She's not listening to me. Do you think that means she doesn't understand the words coming out of your mouth or he doesn't understand the words coming out of your mouth? We get it. It's like, no. I understood. I heard what you said. No. You didn't. What you really when you have that disconnect and fight is because you may have understood the words, but what I'm saying is it's not making any difference. Nothing's changing.

So it's it's it's it's you may have heard words auditory, you listened, but you didn't really hear. You didn't apply. Nothing changed. This Greek word for auditory just means did you hear and under did you recollect and understand the sounds? It's the same word the same Greek word where in our English we get audit.

Auditor. To audit something. Have you ever audited a class? And audited class is when you audit class, what is it? You you pay a little bit less. And when you go in and audit a class, it means you're just gonna come in, you're just paying to hear the information.

You don't have to do the homework. You don't have to do assignments. You're not accountable, but you also don't get credit for it. You just wanted to come, listen,

and hear and take away what you wanna take away. Ignore what you wanna ignore. You just wanna be in control of of learning but not really being in. I audited the class. What he's saying here is, guys, and this is the problem. This is the problem with this group that he's challenging here. And I believe the context and cultural things going on here is so applicable to us, especially in the western suburban church. He's saying, you can't audit your faith.

You can't take your faith for not credit and just say I wanna come and listen and I'll take a few good ideas and whatever, but I'm not really accountable. What that means is too many of us audit our faith. Here's the big throw punch. I love this church. Best church I've ever been a part of.

But I believe that is the number one problem in this church. You know why? Because I think it's the number one problem in every church, especially in our Western culture. It's why our culture is running away. It's why we run-in fear. We just run with the culture afraid of everything. Because too many of us who know Jesus,

you're choosing to audit your faith. You like coming to the lecture. You like having music and lecture,

but you like to go why I didn't really take this so I'm I'm not really responsible to be part of this church. When we talk about giving and serving and all these things you've been coming here forever, you're a Christian, and for some reason you never connect the dots so that means you.

And if you're not doing it, it's sin. You're not listening to God's clear command in your life. You don't get to audit Christianity. If you are a Christian and you go to a church, you need to engage and be a member of that church and be a be active as a Christian like the Bible commands you to. But too many of us audit

our faith. You know what happens when we audit our faith? We start to act too much like the world. So when things like Las Vegas happen and everyone's freaking out,

which it's a sad sad tragic broken thing, but when you understand what's going on in the world, it's a broken world where broken people break people, hurt people hurt people, and guess what the church is called to do? Guess what we're supposed to be doing church?

We should be running towards a hurt world with the love of Jesus.

But we run away screaming like everyone else, And you know what we end up doing? We end up thinking we're doing something about it by opening by just getting all mad and fighting about politics and getting on Facebook. You know what we're doing? We're doing what verse nineteen and twenty says. Talking a whole lot, listening little, and not loving.

We're just angry people. And then guess what? The world looks at the church and they get mad because you know what? They don't see a church that believes in Jesus, that has incredible faith, that runs towards the problems, that sacrifices and serves and loves. And and and the world knows we're Christians by our love, that we're loving one another. We're all auditing our faith. We're just coming to listen, you know, and and and and doing that. So we don't really engage. We don't go all in with who we are and what we have into the mission that we've been called to do. So we sit back and the world only seizes the bunch of people that yells at the sinners.

And what would happen? What would happen? Alright. Hold it. I'll give you something to clap for right here. This will be clap worthy. What if we stopped yelling at sinners and started acting like Christians? How would that change the world? Now that you can clap for. That's the problem. That's what James is going after.

And it's the same thing. We're afraid and we run. Because we're not receptive to God's word. We don't reflect on it, and we obviously don't respond to it. There's a reason why God calls us to do this with our time, to do this with our money, to spend our emotional energy on things that matter.

And I think we have a culture thing too. We've set up a culture thing here that that that engaging in just being frustrated, and and venting, and worrying, and thinking deeply. We've equated all those to actually doing something.

So when you get on your social media, or you sit around, or you have coffee with someone, you complain about something, you go we get all worked up. You realize everything you choose to engage in spends emotional energy. And we only have so much emotional energy.

And when I spend all my emotional energy on that, guess what? You go, man, I've really done something, haven't I? And we haven't done anything.

I mean, we live in a culture, even in the church culture, we give away awards for like, I read through the Bible. We give people awards for reading through the Bible. How about award for, I did the Bible. Wouldn't that be better? That'd be the better award rather than I memorized it. I actually lived it.

That's the award. We've we've kind of said it's about information gathering and blasting on this, but what happens if I just started responding to God's word on the simplest things?

The biggest arguments I get is I'll have people come and want to debate with me on something, they'll be coming to the church. Hey, why don't you preach on this? Why don't you get into this? Why don't we have depth? When do you think the world's gonna end? You should be preaching more on prophecies and all this stuff even though Jesus said, you're never gonna know. Don't even try to guess, but yet we all go why don't we talk about He already said that's a waste of time.

You know what you should do if you know that someone's coming to pick you up for another trip? And you don't know when he's coming? Pack. Just get ready. That's a better thing to do than to sit around to be, you think he'll come tomorrow? No. Maybe he'll come in ten minutes. Oh, oh, he's here.

We need to respond to God's word because he loves us. Get get get me get straight here. It's he knows what's best for us, and that's why he said you're only fooling yourself if you do it any other way. But he says in the end, he goes, this is where you will truly be blessed. Truly be blessed.

Stop auditing the faith. I love in verse 25 in a one of the more paraphrased versions. It says this, the man who puts the law into practice wins true happiness. And I love where it says, if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free. He's talking about God's word

and he says, it sets you free. Here's the part you need to realize. If you're holding back on really getting involved, it's usually because you have this idea that engaging with my time, engaging with my money, really going in is somehow gonna confine me.

You think that trusting God with all this is gonna hold you back. I can't give because I'm already broke and I'm just gonna it's gonna limit me. I can't serve because I'm already stretched thin. It's gonna limit me.

I can't really love my spouse in the way that God says because you know Giving that much and with not knowing if I'm gonna get in return, that's that's gonna limit me. See, we we we keep thinking that's the evil he talks about. That's the earwax.

There's a world out there that says that that lies to us and says, I need to conserve. I need to hold in. I need to keep. I need to hold it back. And he's saying, the law of God, when he says trust me in this way, he says that's what sets you free.

So sometimes being generous, giving, going on, that's the way to get the freedom, but we seem as it's the holding us back. That's the ear wax folks. And that's why it always scares me to preach this message because I'm so fearful that we as Christians have become so culturalized

in our own culture that that what I'm saying is infuriating you. But you know I've realized? Every now and then you gotta hit the gas pedal and see what falls off the car. Because if it falls off as my daddy used to say it wasn't attached in the first place.

So if you can't handle a throat punch of God's love you better start asking yourself are you even a Christian?

Are you even a Christian? Because that's coming in a couple weeks. We're gonna it's gonna really get down to it. I'm just setting the stage for where we're going in James. You can read ahead. You know royal throat punch is coming. But it's a challenge. Where do you want your life to go?

Is really what he's saying. Because here's what he says. Here here he he finishes it with a very clear explanation of what then should it look like

when I choose to do God's word. He gives a little summary. It says in verse 26, if you claim to be religious. Now every that word that's translated religious here, every place else in scripture it's translated worship. It's really a word for worship.

So it says, if you claim to worship but don't control your tongue, you're fooling yourself, and your worship is worthless.

Pure and genuine worship in the sight of God, the father, means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you. He said three things there that's really kind of an example. He said, basically what he's saying is the result of really doing God's word should be a life that has a controlled mouth,

a caring heart, and a clean mind. I should have a controlled mouth, a caring heart, and a clean mind. You know how many people that I've I've gotten so

just frustrated with when when we battle, but you know they come to me and want to battle or you look on social media. I've seen so many Christians that have no control and all you want to do is spew stuff. But yet they're not engaged in their church.

That's the caring heart. When it says we should care about orphans on, that was their current biggest problem that he was dealing with. What he's trying to say is you should control your mouth. Don't be an arguer all the time. You should actually be involved in sacrificially serving your community and your church.

It's basically shut up and put up is what he's saying. And he goes and the reason you do that is because you have to battle by refusing to let the world corrupt you. The world wants to corrupt you into thinking maturity is about information. It's about accumulating information. When maturity is about getting transformation.

And you're not gonna get transformed if you don't trust God's word. It's that simple. And you can fight it and fight it and fight it. Refer to verse 19 to 21 again. How many times you want to get frustrated frustrated frustrated, make excuses, argue argue argue, fail fail fail, get angry get angry get angry. Your choice.

But I'll just ask you, how's it been working out for you so far? In the end, the world wants to distort what we're called to do. That's what he's saying. Don't listen to the lies. Remember a throat punch is a spiritual truth that's gonna challenge us where it hurts, but it's gonna wake us up from that false living

that's not gonna get you where you want to go. I don't know if you've ever heard of a guy named Larry Walters. He had like a ten seconds of fame back in like 1982. Larry was a guy that grew up, always dreamt of flying.

And and and man, he was 13, he had this idea of when he would always sit out on his lawn chair, you know, drinking out of his cooler, and sodas or whatever. He's eating a sandwich. He would imagine, what if I attach weather balloons to this lawn chair? I could probably fly. But you know, he never really did that. But he he went on, get a pilot's license, wanted to go in the air force, but he had an eye issue. Couldn't get in the air force, so he just went on with life, ended up being a truck driver amongst other things, but at this in 1982, was a truck driver. He had this girlfriend at the time, and he's like, okay, this is maybe going somewhere, and she wanted to be very supportive and said, he was never really happy.

So they're saying, hey, you know, you should go for your dream. Your dream was fly. What was that last dream you had? You've been a pilot, but you you had this other dream. And he finally said, you know what? It's the dream of the chair. So in 1982 at age 30, he actually did go get a bunch of of of weather balloons,

and he tied them up, filled them with helium, tied his lawn chair down. Same lawn chair he'd sit on his lawn in. He attached a cooler with some beer and sandwiches in it, took a took a a CB radio and a pellet gun.

And what his plan was, I'll float up, I'll probably get about 6,000 feet, then and when I wanna come down, I'll just shoot a balloon or two. And then I'll I'll I'll float back down. So he sat in that chair, cut the ropes. Here's a picture. Got one here. There he is. And he immediately shot up to 16,000 feet.

Did his math wrong. And the reason we know he's six sixty thousand feet because of the two airliners, air the airplanes that reported him as they were coming into Long Beach International Airport that, hey, the you're not gonna believe this tower, but we just passed a guy in a lawn chair.

Eating a sandwich and drinking a beer. Yeah. He's at 16,000 feet currently.

And after they've brought it, he flew into Long Beaches airspace, shut down the airport for two hours. They didn't even know what to do. They're like, what do we do? We know he's breaking the law, but but there's none nobody's ever done something like this. So they're just waiting. And then the reason they're waiting is he going up so high, he freaked out, and he was second guessing. Man, if I shoot the wrong balloon, what if the chair tip tips slightly and I fall out? So finally, he said this. So I gotta come down. So he finally shot a couple. It did move a little and he dropped his pellet gun. Fortunately,

he'd shot two and he was coming down, but he was just coming down really slow. So it took a while. So either waiting, waiting, and as he came down and got lower over Long Beach, the cables from the ones he shot got tangled in power lines and caused a power outage to half of Long Beach.

And then he was stuck. He couldn't climb down because of the so he's just floating there like 50 feet off the ground. The police show up. They're like, what do we do? And and and they finally know what they got a cable up or they they got them down and he arrested them.

And and when they asked, why would you do this? There's already reporters there. Why did you do this? He goes, I don't know. I was growing up. I always wanted to fly like that. I thought that was my dream of life and I thought if I didn't just do it, I would end up in the funny Farm. I would just end up at the funny Farm. And so then his final lines are putting him in the police cars. And you know what? Sometimes you just can't sit there.

You gotta do something. That was his line. Now that you know you think is that supposed to be inspirational? No. This is what I mean about don't get distorted by the evil of the world. Because think about it. Think about it. He finally did this goal. You'd think his tortured life would would end. Right?

Didn't change anything. Girlfriend ended up breaking up with him. She's like, you're not. Nothing's he started losing jobs. He finally did this thing that he thought he was supposed to do, and it didn't change. Ten years later, Larry Walters killed himself. Killed himself, the guy who flew. But think about maybe why.

He said sometimes you can't just sit there, you gotta do something. But what would he always sit what would he do when he dreamt of flying? Sit in his lawn chair and drink beer and eat a sandwich. So didn't he technically just do the exact same thing that he always did? He just did it at 16,000 feet higher in the air.

That's the lie of the world folks. See, think about your life. What are you aiming at? What do you think is the goal that if I can just get to this, life will make sense? And if you're honest, just honestly reflect. How different is my endgame goal different than what I'm already doing?

Am I running after the exact same thing I'm already doing? I just want to do it at a higher altitude. Are you running after a goal that's just the same exact principles? The same exact thing, just a higher altitude. Well, I got this house. I'm not happy, but you know if I keep working hard, I can get this house.

I I I got kids and now if I keep working, they'll be good kids and I'll get this. I'll get them educated and I'll teach them to start in a little house and get a bigger house. If if if if I work real hard at this, maybe my marriage will be good. Now those are not bad things to run after a good marriage or be successful. They're not evil things. But what I'm saying is those are not the main thing of what God wants in our lives.

But see the lie of the world is just make it about that. Are we running after the same thing your non Christian neighbors run after? If you think about what your goals in life and you talk to someone that doesn't know the Lord, how many of those goals would you all agree on?

Are we just trying to do it at a higher altitude? I'll be nicer and I'll give God the credit for it. And if you get there someday, you're gonna realize nothing's different.

I'm just floating higher in the sky. That's what James is challenging us with. Stop trying to do the same thing at a higher altitude. Start trusting me. Don't just listen. Actually, apply God's word to your life.

So where are you at on it? Is it something you need to receive? Maybe you reflect more? Or maybe you're going, yeah, I know. And if it's maybe the way to get more involved and engaged as a follower, go to rockpoint.io.

There's ways to get involved, to serve, to find community, to give. There's there's all that you can go on there and say, I'm gonna start activating my faith and doing what God said. Don't just do the same thing you're doing at a higher altitude. Father God, thank you Lord.

Lord, I thank you that that when you throat punch us, it's because you love us. So Lord, I'm gonna make this prayer super simple. It's for myself and for everyone in this room. I just pray that we would see your love so clearly that we would have the courage to not just listen to your word, but actually do it.

That's my prayer and I prayed in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.