Ralph Porter

© 2003

    Chuck Colson told the story of Andrew Sawus, a sixteen-year-old Christian in Sudan, who soldiers attempted to "convert" to their religion. They tied his wrists and ankles behind his back, and began to kick and beat him, demanding that he renounce Christ. He refused and, as a result, suffered a blow to the head which caused permanent brain damage.

    Five million Christians in that country alone are suffering persecution because of their faith in Christ. Two million have died. A thousand a day are starving to death. Their churches are being bombed. Their children are taken as slaves. All of that in just that one country, in our time, because of their faith in Christ. Such conditions are being repeated in numerous countries all over the world. How do you plan for the future when faced with conditions like that?

    For eight years we received monthly reports concerning the three missionary families from Colombia whose husbands and fathers were taken captive by guerrillas. For years their families never heard a word-not knowing whether they were dead or alive. How do you "get on with your life" under such conditions? How do you plan for tomorrow?

    David and Lisa, are friends of ours with a young family and two small children who packed up their family and headed for a country where they may face considerable risk of persecution and personal danger for both them and their children. How can you plan to expose your family to risks like that?

    Some of you face an uncertain future. Rumors are floating around the plant, or around the office, that they may be going to close the Warsaw office, or cut back operations. How do you plan to face tomorrow?

    Some of you are looking forward to retirement within the next couple of years. For some that leaves some anxiety about how you'll make ends meet-especially when your 401(k) just collapsed! How can we be sure that our money won't run out before our month does? How do we plan to cover our expenses when the cash flow stops? Will there be enough? How will we provide for our needs for tomorrow?

    When you're trying to deal with the implications of a broken marriage--your husband just walked out on you, what do you do then? How will you face your family's needs tomorrow?

We can make lots of plans, but at times like these it becomes increasingly clear that we don't control the future! Where do we turn then? How should Christians dealing with hard times today plan to face tomorrow?

    Christians in the first century faced similar questions affecting their life. James is addressing persecuted Christians who were facing hard times and uncertain tomorrows. How should they plan for tomorrow, in light of hard times they're going through?

    Throughout the whole letter James has tried to help suffering Christians understand what a living faith looks like in the midst of hard times. His final assertion concerning faith is that living faith produces peace (3:13-5:6).

    Peace is the result of seeking God's wisdom (3:13-17). But they were fighting and quarreling because they weren't seeking God's wisdom. They wanted their own way (4:1-6)! These suffering Christians keep busy arguing and complaining against each other; they're not finding peace!

    So what is the solution for all the fighting going on among them? How do you get it to stop? The answer is found in two key words that we never like to hear about: submission and dependence. We will find peace in the midst of turmoil by practicing three basic steps:

               1.    Submit to God 4:7-10

               2.    Submit to one another 4:11-12

               3.    Depend on the Lord, rather than on our own plans and finances 4:13-5:6

    We've already considered the first two steps. James deals with two specific ways we demonstrate our dependence on the Lord. This morning we want to consider how our dependence on the Lord relates to the plans we make (4:13-17).

    Contrary to popular opinion, James does not criticize them for making plans. We sometimes say to someone, "See you next Sunday!" Often they respond, "Well, Lord willing!" The response seems to indicate that it's wrong to assume we'll see each other in a week. While we recognize that we may not see each other next week, That's not the issue James is dealing with in this passage! This isn't just a mantra, to be repeated in a parrot-like fashion every time we make a statement about the future.

    To understand what James is trying to tell us, notice the nature of their plans. They were going to go to another town for a year, engage in business, and make a bundle! They are making their plans the way the world makes its plans. These are self-centered plans.  They're seeking personal gain. They leave God out of the picture! They are living like practical atheists--living as if there is no God! It's not that they don't believe in God. They have already demonstrated that they do. However, they are making their plans the way atheists plan. They're leaving God out of their plans! James wants us to understand where this path logically leads so that we will learn to depend on God alone when we make our plans for the future.

    James introduces the problem by describing the normal human approach to adverse circumstances. What do people going through hard times focus on? Look at James 4:13:

    "Come now, You are saying "today or tomorrow we'll go to such and such a city, and we'll

    spend a year there, and we'll do business and we'll make money."

    When we are going through hard times, we try to come up with a plan to avoid the pain. People look for a "way of escape"--a way out! Their plan to go to another town to earn money reflects a wish to get a fresh start where they can hide in the crowd-where no one knows them-where they can get a fresh start in life.

    In Guatemala, people go "to the other side." They cross the border to move away from their problem, get a fresh start and make a lot of money. They assume that will solve their problem. Rather than trust God to provide, they come up with a scheme to solve their own problem--just like us!

    I've observed four common goals people try to achieve when they're going through hard times. While they are expressed in ways that sound different than James expresses, they are an accurate reflection of the four things James says they were trying to achieve. Like the early church, when we face hard times, (1) we try to escape. We want to get away from it all. (2) We try to settle down and be comfortable. (3) We want to "get on with our life." People want to leave the turmoil behind, get it over with, and get a fresh start on life. Actually, the expression James uses in this passage, while it can be genuinely applied to engaging in business, literally resembles our modern expression "to get on with your life." People are still pursuing this goal as if it were their right. (4) The final goal people pursue is to try to come up with a way to make money.

    The Jewish believers thought: "Tomorrow we're out of here! Let's take a year off, go somewhere for a year or so, start a business, and make a lot of money!" This is human wisdom. It's not from God. It doesn't produce peace. It produces conflict. It's every man for himself!

    So, what's wrong with this approach? What do people who pursue human solutions forget? Look at verse 14:

    "You do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are like a cloud that appears for

    a little while and then vanishes."

    James shows us three things that people who make a plan to escape the turmoil forget. The first thing we forget is that we don't know what will happen tomorrow. The second thing we forget is that life is short. The third thing we forget is a truth that underlies the whole verse: we're not in charge! I like the way the Phillips paraphrase expresses the thought of these verses: "How do you know what will happen even tomorrow? What, after all, is your life? It is like a puff of smoke visible a little while and then dissolving into thin air."

    When we pursue human solutions, we forget that we don't even know what tomorrow holds, much less control it. As I was meditating on this thought this week, I was reminded of the terror it produces when I read people talking about the day when we will control the weather. Does that strike as much fear in you as it does in me? We can't even predict the weather, much less control it! That's what James is saying about our schemes. Following human wisdom overlooks the fact that we don't have the ability to make things happen our way!

    What difference should there be between the plans God's children make, and the world's plans? Should we make plans at all? What should our plans look like? What should people going through hard times focus on? Notice verse 15:

    "Instead, you should be saying, "If the Lord wills, we will live and we will do this or that."

    The corrective to our normal human approach: Instead of making our own self-centered schemes, we need to trust God to solve our problem. When we go through hard times, we ought to focus on God, and on accomplishing His will! We must depend on the Lord and let Him have His way in our life!

    The center of our focus ought to be on what God wants! God knows our situation and He controls the world. He has a perfect plan for our life. He knows what He's doing. If we want real peace, we would be better off to place ourselves in His hands and let Him give us His solution.

    When James says that we ought to say: "If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that," he is not giving us a ritual to repeat every time we talk about our plans for the rest of the week. Many people use it that way, like parrots repeating what they've heard--often without even thinking of what it means. It's acknowledging what the songwriter expressed: "I know not what the future holds, but I know who holds the future!"

    People often overlook one phrase in this verse, and miss an important point James wants us to understand. Notice that even staying alive depends on Him--"if the Lord wills, then we will live." We might not be around tomorrow! People often repeat the expression, "A man's gotta live!" Who says we have to live? Pleasing Him is our goal--not staying alive!

    Our prayer ought to be: "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven! Paul expresses it by desiring that "whether by life or by death, Christ may be exalted in me." That's the goal; not survival! James wants us to recognize God's control of our lives, and submit our plans for living to His plans. When we make plans, we should ask what He wants from us tomorrow! This is the wisdom that's from above. This is the wisdom that produces peace.

    I want to come back to this verse as we conclude our reflection on God's Word, but before we do that, James mentions one more negative reason for planning on the basis of God's wisdom, rather than on the basis of human reasoning. What do people who pursue human wisdom produce in the midst of hard times (16-17)? What's the fruit of this approach to the turmoil in our life? Look at verse 16:

    "But now, you are boasting in your arrogant thoughts. All such boasting is evil."

    James warns us about the danger of pride. He has warned us several times that coming up with our own scheme-one that we think is better than God's plan-is pride. Like the old Phil Kerr chorus, we think: "If the dreams that I dream would come true, if the schemes that I scheme I could do, then it seems there would be contentment for me!" That attitude-the attitude that "I have a better idea"-is sin! Your boasting is wrong-it's evil.

    There's a second fruit that human reasoning produces when we follow our own plan, rather than God's. You see it in verse 17:

    "Therefore, to the one who knows what's right and doesn't do it, to him it is sin"

    This is a universal principle which is true in all of life. You can apply it to any area of living. When our conscience tells us that something is wrong for us, we shouldn't do it. Period. However, in this passage, James issues a specific warning about the danger of disobedience, as it relates to following God's plan for our life, when we'd rather have it our own way-when we'd rather follow our own plan. To reject God's way and pursue our own way is to refuse to do what's right. It's rebellion! It's sin!

    When we pursue human wisdom, it results in pride and disobedience, both of which are sin in God's sight! Our plans lead to arrogant boasting and rebellion. God says that's sin! Again the same principle we saw in 4:6 is applicable: "God opposes the proud, but gives more grace to the humble."

    Rather than trust our self-centered plans, which easily fail, we are to trust God to resolve our problem.

When we face hard times, our top priority should be to seek God's will 

above everything else--even before staying alive!

               Making money isn't the goal--pleasing God is!

               Achieving success isn't the goal--pleasing God is!

               Staying alive isn't the goal--pleasing God is!

    So, how do you plan for the future in the midst of persecution like our brothers in sisters in Christ are facing in Sudan today? How do you plan for the future when you're not sure if you'll even have a job tomorrow? Or if your retirement funds may not be sufficient to make it? Or when your spouse has decided to walk away? Or when your faced with a series of uncertainties about the future?

    What will this look like in real life for us this week? I don't know what circumstances you will face this week, but let me point to some of the ways it might happen in some of our lives. We make our 5-year plan, and then God changes it! We sit down and work out all the steps to get from "point A" to "point B." "Here's how we're going to get out of debt in three years." Then we get laid off from our job!

    When God told us it was time to leave Salt Lake City, we had no idea where we were going. He said "Resign. Trust me. I'll take you to a place I have prepared for you!" He took us to the desert! After five years in the desert He said "Trust me!"--like Abraham did, without knowing where he was going. So we set out to an unknown promised land. And God brought us to Warsaw. Everybody told us, "but it's cold in the winter!" Actually we found it's warm here-even in the winter. That wasn't our plan--that was God's plan! God took us to Tucson; and God has given us Warsaw! We had to learn to trust Him in the dark-even when the plan didn't seem to make much sense.

    Young people, you have some important decisions to make about your future. How do you decide what to do with your life? Do you decide based on the potential salary? Work conditions? Benefits? Job security? Or, will you decide by asking what God wants? Our friends David and Lisa made a hard decision. Stan and Julie face some huge uncertainties as they plan for ministry in another country! Who knows what the risks may be? Yet they have decided to do what God wants-no matter what the cost.

    What about you? What are you facing this week? Are you ready to trust Him with your future? When the troubles pour in on us, we must learn to focus on Him-- seek His will first--before anything else! What's your plan for tomorrow? Have you planned to do His will? Whatever that may be?