An Exposition on the Book of James Part 18
If you haven’t yet, please check out part 1 of this series. The ideas of the book of James are all centered around the idea of a perfectly forged faith that makes us perfect.
The world in which we live in today is full of presumption. We take for granted that the car will start when we turn the key (or push the button). We travel to many different places in the course of a week, and we presumed we will arrive unscathed. Often, we are surprised when things do not happen the way they always do. We often get frustrated and mad because of this.
In America, we all live very presumptuously. Most Americans contribute to a 401k retirement savings account. They presume that their money will grow and they will be able to not work in their latter years and retire. They assume things will go the way the always have. They will be able to buy and sell and get gain.
As I am typing this, we have just experienced a turn on a silver and gold market that hasn’t ever happened before. About a year ago gold was growing steadily over $2,500 a troy ounce and silver was sitting at around $30. People are always speculation on what the price is going to do, and eventually at the end of 2025, gold and silver started a steady climb. Just a few days ago gold reach an all-time high of around $5,473 a troy ounce and up to $118.48 for silver. Gold more than doubled and silver nearly quadrupled.
Some speculate a lot of things about every type of market and boast when they make a lot of “gain” but in reality, there are many more losers than there are winners in this game. The truth is that the markets are highly suppress and manipulated, and are all based on a fake standard. Gold and silver used to be the standard and now they are treated like a commodity. The sad truth is that our world is like a giant bounce house. It looks really fun, but its only being held up by hot air pumped into the system.
James starts off by warning against presumptuous living. It is one thing to work hard and believe that God will take care of your necessities. it is another entirely to presume upon the goodness of God. I believe that many American Christians live presumptuously, while thinking they life by faith. Really the difference is not between faith and presumption, but between faith in God and faith in something else.
Many people put faith in their retirement, or their cars, or their family, or their health, their insurance, doctors or their own wisdom. Their faith can lie in a pendant shaped like a cross hanging around their neck, or in an expert; in luck, or many other things but they fail to seek the only thing that is faithful. God is the only wise God; he is the only one that knows the future. God can take care of everything; He was not caught off guard by silver and gold dropping drastically today. He knew exactly what would come to pass. He knows what will be going on next week and next year. This is one reason why we as a family do not buy health insurance, besides all of the corruption that is tied with it. We trust God. We do not presume that everything will be okay, nor do we place our faith in a manmade system or a PHD. We Try to handle our finances wisely but trust that God will give us wisdom and lead us through the valleys and the mountains.
The truth of the matter is that we do not know the very next minute. A call may come in that changes your world. A wreck can happen in seconds. Money makes itself wings and flies away. People drop dead of heart attacks in the peak of health. For the Christian this should be a grave reminder to live for Christ and try to walk according to his ways. Even if bad things happen, we are supposed to look at those events through the light of scripture.
I read the end of Romans 8 this morning, and it is so good to know that in a world of inconsistency and change that we serve a God who is immutable. He does not change and his love for us cannot be altered in the least bit. Even in our death he is faithful to love us and he finds the death of his saints to be precious. There is only one constant, and that is Christ. We must always be mindful that our desire may not be his will. We cannot presume that God wants us to be rich, or that he wants to have babies, or that he even wants us to move to another country as witnesses for his name’s sake. We must say – if the Lord wills, my desire is to achieve what he has given me liberty for. Even the man who desires something the word of God commends – like working hard – if he is doing his work out of presumption and not out of faith it is a great evil.
The Christian must know that God is in control of all things. He is wise and his ways are right. When we submit ourselves to his rulings and allow him to guide us, we will find a peace that surpasses the fake insurance the world offers and find the beautiful assurance that God offers. Therefore, if you know to do something is good, you must do the good; if you know that selling what you have and giving it to the poor is what God has for you, you must. If quitting your job is what God has for you then you must. If you are presuming upon something and not believing God then that is sin. If you know that something is God’s will, though it goes against your presumption, to not do the known will of God is sin.
One last thought. There was a young Liberian boy who was brought to the Lord under miraculous circumstances. Eventually he had a desire to reach his tribe – his family – for Christ. He studied and studied but his thirst for God could not be quench at the mission where he lived. Eventually, Samuel “Kaboo” Morris boarded a boat to New York with no money and not knowing how to get where he was going. Many looked at his journey as presumption, but he looked at it as believing God. He eventually found his way to Taylor University to study the Bible. It was his desire to learn all he could and go back to his tribe to reach his lost family and even his enemies. He caused no small stir among the Christian populous of New York in the late 1800’s/ His story was quickly set to print and his life inspired many to dedicate their lives to God and go to Africa for God.
It was always Samuel’s intent to go back home, but he would soon find himself ill and on his deathbed. He then understood that it was not God’s will for him to return to Africa, but to go home to be with Jesus. He was happy to surrender his own desires – though noble as they were – to commit his life into the hands of his savior. This reminds me a great deal of the Apostle Paul who had a strong desire to see his brethren – Isreal – saved, but he understood his calling was to the Gentiles. We can never tell what God will do with a vessel that is yielded to him, but one thing is sure, we must trust his guiding hand no matter what our logic tells us.
James 4:13-17 KJV
Go to now, ye that say, To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain:
Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.
For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.
But now ye rejoice in your boastings: all such rejoicing is evil.
Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.
S. T.
Acts 20:24
"But none of these things move me..."
Edited 2/10/2025 C.C.
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