James

[0:00] So we are in the book of James, and James is an interesting book. I think it gets a lot of, it causes a lot of confusion. But just to kind of summarize, we talked about James. Also, sometimes we'll call it Jacob because that is the name of James.

[0:17] It's the name of Jacob. But James, we call it, you could call it a Hebrew epistle, a kingdom epistle, a Jewish epistle.

[0:31] And the book of James, or the letter of James, is different from the Pauline epistles. The Pauline epistles are written to the body of Christ, mostly Gentiles. We are the body of Christ.

[0:42] James was not writing to the body of Christ. James was writing to Jewish believers in the Messiah. And the context is very different. Jewish believers in the Messiah, before Israel had been cut off, were waiting for the imminent return of Jesus Christ.

[1:04] And were specifically expecting to go through a very, very, very difficult time. A time we call the tribulation, in which they would be tested, there would be a testing by fire, there would be a separation ultimately, at the end of that time, between the sheep and the goats.

[1:27] But this difficult trial would help bring about that separation, and show who the true faithful ones were, and who the unfaithful ones were.

[1:40] So, that's the context. I think we're only eight verses in, after a few weeks.

[1:51] Today, I plan to go through verse 9, 10, and 11. So, only three verses, but hopefully, in the weeks to come, we'll get through a little bit quicker. But we're trying to lay a foundation here, as we study this book.

[2:04] As we've read in the beginning, the very first, or I guess it's the second verse. Well, here, let me open up to it. My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials.

[2:18] So, the context, as he starts this letter, is trials, persecution, difficulty, tribulation, we might call it.

[2:33] And it's easy to think that James is just kind of jumping around different thoughts and ideas.

[2:44] But I'm very certain that he's not, that he's continuing along the same vein, but just talking about different aspects of it. So, let's jump in here to verse 9.

[2:56] And we'll look at these three verses today. Let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation, but the rich in his humiliation, because as a flower of the field, he will pass away.

[3:12] For no sooner has the sun risen with a burning heat than it withers the grass. Its flower falls, and its beautiful appearance perishes, so the rich man also will fade away in his pursuits.

[3:30] So, just looking at this first section of James, there have been talks, he's talked about enduring through trials and the value that comes with that. He's talked about the importance of having wisdom and getting the wisdom that you need.

[3:49] Not being double-minded, having faith. And now he's talking about the rich and the poor. And he'll talk about more about that in verse, or excuse me, in chapter 2.

[4:04] There's more about the rich and the poor. And then in verse 12, if we look a little bit further, he talks about temptations. So, it seems like there's a lot of jumping around, but I don't think that's the case at all.

[4:17] I think James is talking about the specific situation of the believers in which he's writing to, this dispersion of Jews who live out among the Gentiles. They don't live in Jerusalem where James and the other 12 apostles are, or at least the ones who are left, who haven't been killed yet.

[4:34] But they're living out among the Gentiles. They're called the dispersion. But they're experiencing some of the same, similar things. There is persecution going on. And this is persecution that has been expected.

[4:48] In fact, it's been prophesied by the ancient prophets. So, let's just ask a few questions.

[5:00] Well, let's look specifically at this verse. Verse 9 again. Let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation. So, if you're a lowly person, glory in your exaltation.

[5:12] Well, that sounds strange. If you're low, how could you glory in your exaltation? But the rich in his humiliation, those who are rich and high and mighty, what might call it, right?

[5:25] Glory in their humiliation, their being made low. That sounds strange. That sounds opposite of the way things are or should be.

[5:40] You know, if you are rich and powerful, you should glory in that you are exalted. And if you're poor, you should, you know, you're humbled. You are already humbled.

[5:52] There's no reason to glory necessarily in that. In fact, what we're going to look at is that the time in which, the time in the dispensation, if you will, that's a big word, but most of us here are very familiar with that word.

[6:08] The time in which James is writing, the people he's writing to, are in a very specific period of time, which the Bible prophesied about.

[6:19] Things work differently. It's an era in which the kingdom is being offered. There is an entrance to the kingdom that is being preached, but it requires going through deep trials.

[6:35] We'll talk about this era of the kingdom, but first let's go back and ask questions. Well, under the Old Covenant and the Old Testament, what is God's view or the Bible's view of riches and poverty?

[6:51] Is riches always a negative thing? Is poverty always a positive thing? Let's turn your Bibles to Deuteronomy chapter 8.

[7:02] Deuteronomy 8 and verse 18. Deuteronomy 7 is a chapter talking about the covenant of the law, covenant of Moses, in which he promises, or God promises, blessing if you are faithful to the covenant, and curses if you don't.

[7:38] And among those blessings are many material blessings. In fact, if you go back to chapter 7, let's just start in verse 12.

[7:53] Then it shall come to pass, because you listen to these judgments, and keep and do them, that the Lord your God will keep with you the covenant and the mercy which he swore to your fathers.

[8:05] He will love you and bless you and multiply you. He will also bless the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your land, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flock, and the land of which he swore to your fathers to give you.

[8:22] You shall be blessed above all peoples. And he continues to go on and on and on. And then he switches and talks about the curses of the law too. But part of these blessings is riches and wealth.

[8:36] Part of the curses is poverty. In chapter 8, verse 18, he says this. Well, let's start in verse 17. He's giving a warning.

[8:49] He says, If you then say in your heart, My power and the might of my hand has gained me this wealth. He's warning against doing that.

[9:00] Once you've become blessed, he says in verse 18, And you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant, which he swore to your fathers as it is this day.

[9:14] So he made a covenant with the Jews and said, If you are faithful, I want to bless you with material things, with riches, with wealth. It's a blessing.

[9:25] Riches are a blessing. Now, in some ways, they can be not a blessing. We'll talk about that maybe a bit later. But God considers riches, wealth, to be a blessing.

[9:40] Let's look at Psalm 112. We'll start with verse 1.

[9:57] Go to verse 3. Praise the Lord. Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who delights greatly in his commandments. His descendants will be mighty on earth.

[10:10] The generation of the upright will be blessed. Wealth and riches will be in his house, and his righteousness endures forever. If you live uprightly, if you live righteously, then you can expect to have wealth and riches.

[10:26] Not as a curse, right, but as a blessing. Wealth and riches as a blessing of living a righteous life. I'll just read this one last verse, just for time's sake.

[10:40] Proverbs 8, 20 and 21 says this, I traverse the way of righteousness in the midst of the paths of justice, that I may cause those who love me, this is wisdom speaking, to inherit wealth, that I may fill their treasures.

[10:57] When you live uprightly, when you live a wise life, you end up inheriting great wealth, or earning great wealth, we might say.

[11:09] Also, the Bible teaches that wealth is the natural result of diligence and wisdom. If you read through Proverbs, and I'll just list a few here, again for the sake of time, but Proverbs 3, 16 says this, length of days, this is talking about wisdom, length of days is in her right hand, in wisdom's right hand.

[11:33] In her left hand, riches and honor. If you have wisdom, you could expect to grow in wealth and riches. Proverbs 8, 18, riches and honor are with me.

[11:48] Again, this is wisdom speaking. Enduring riches. And righteousness. Now that's interesting, because he says enduring riches. Because there are other riches that are not enduring.

[12:00] In fact, I don't think I have any examples, but there are other Proverbs that say that when you are not righteous, you can expect your riches ultimately to come to ruin. But in the Old Testament, it also says that the wicked prosper.

[12:16] And that's true in our day too. Psalm 73, 12, says this, behold, these are the ungodly who are always at ease. They increase in riches.

[12:31] Psalm 37, 16 says this, a little that a righteous man has is better than the riches of many wicked. So it's better to be righteous and not wealthy than to be rich and not righteous.

[12:51] Let's turn to Psalm 49. We'll look at this one. This one is worth reading the whole thing.

[13:08] So ultimately, it talks about our mortality. And there's a saying that's said among religious and non-religious alike, you can't take it with you.

[13:21] Have you heard that? Everybody's heard that, right? And this Psalm is basically that saying. You can't take it with you. We're all going to die. We all have mortality.

[13:31] And the riches that we build in this life, you can't take to the grave. Let's look at, we'll just pick out a few verses. Well, verse one and two.

[13:45] Hear this, all peoples. Give ear, all inhabitants of the world, both low and high, rich and poor together. Well, I'll reference this verse later on.

[13:56] Low and high are references to those who are lowly and those who are up high. The rich are up high, the poor are down low. My mouth, oh, excuse me, verse, yeah, two, and we'll go to verse six.

[14:11] Those who trust in their wealth and boast in the multitude of their riches, none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him.

[14:21] For the redemption of their souls is costly and it shall cease forever. That he should continue to live eternally. He's saying, don't, there shouldn't be any rich man out there that thinks that he can use his money, his wealth, to redeem his soul to live forever.

[14:41] Doesn't happen. You know, it's interesting. Today, I, I, I'll see on social media, the news, there is technology today where people can pay tens of thousands of dollars, if not hundreds, I'm not sure what the cost is, but when they die to have their body frozen in a cryogenic state.

[15:07] I think that's the right terminology. And there, people are constantly trying to work to basically make mankind immortal, to see if we can, if we can turn around this constant death that is in our bodies.

[15:27] We all tend towards death. Paul says somewhere, I can't remember where it's at, but he says, our bodies are perishing day by day, but our inner man is being renewed day by day.

[15:41] As Christians, we are being renewed, but our bodies are still continuing to perish. But there's lots of people that don't like that. Right? And the Bible says that death is the last enemy.

[15:53] Some people are trying to defeat it with their own hand, and they will not succeed, but that doesn't stop them from trying. And so, there are lots of rich people I've read who they've set it up, they've paid some company out there, that when they die, they're going to be frozen, and hopefully, sometime in the future, somebody will be able to figure out how to defeat death, and they can come back, and they can continue to enjoy life, their riches, their wealth, and that kind of thing.

[16:23] I think it's a fool's errand, but, you know, it shows you about human nature. God created us as eternal beings. We all want to live, and not just temporarily, we want to live forever.

[16:38] That's the way that God created us, and he created us to live forever. The Psalms, I think it says, he put eternity in our hearts. It's in our hearts to long for eternal life.

[16:52] But, you can't take it with you. Our treasures cannot help us to earn or to gain that eternal life. All right, Job 21.13 says this, they spend their days in wealth, and in a moment, go down to the grave.

[17:10] You can spend your whole life gaining that wealth, but in a moment, it's all over, and you go down to the grave. Let's look at this one, because this will help us transition. Proverbs 11.4.

[17:20] Proverbs 11.4. Proverbs 11.4. Riches do not profit in the day of wrath, but righteousness delivers from death.

[17:44] What is the day of wrath? Well, that's a common phrase used for the day of judgment. But, there can be many days of wrath.

[17:55] There's one ultimate day of wrath in which God will judge mankind, but there are also many days of wrath. They're days of judgment. When God brings judgment on the earth, there have been many days of wrath in which God judged Israel.

[18:09] And when He did that, did the riches of the Israelites help them in any way? No, they were carried off to Babylon or wherever just like anybody else, where their homes, their lands were destroyed just like anyone else.

[18:29] And so, let's keep this in mind. This is an Old Testament proverb under the Old Covenant. But just to reiterate, riches were a blessing under the Old Covenant.

[18:41] And poverty, a curse. And it was a positive thing to have wealth and riches, though there were warnings about putting too much value into it. And poverty is a curse.

[18:56] Not that everybody who was poor was necessarily cursed, but if you were not faithful in righteousness, then you would be under a curse when you would be brought to poverty.

[19:09] So now, if we consider James where we're at, the book of James is written to people not just under the Old Covenant, even though that is true, but under an even more specific dispensation in which the kingdom is at hand.

[19:26] But before the kingdom comes, before the king arrives, and we're at the kingdom of Jesus, we're at the kingdom of Jesus. So the book of James is written to a people at a certain time who are going through this period in preparation for the king to come.

[20:00] There's lots of prophecy about what would happen, what would come to pass before the king would finally arise, or excuse me, arrive. So that's the context of the book of James, and we need to keep that in mind.

[20:18] Again, looking back at this verse, he says, where we're at in James 1.9 here, it says, let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation, but the rich in his humiliation, because as a flower of the field, he will pass away.

[20:33] Is that what, well, the lowly brother, right, we saw that in Psalm 49. Remember I said, hey, let's look at that again. The rich and the poor, the low and the high.

[20:47] The one who is low and the one who is high. Low means, you know, not rich. So again, the context of the book of James here is there's persecution happening.

[21:02] There's testing going on. That's what was the purpose of persecution, was testing. Let's look at Isaiah chapter 40.

[21:13] And we're going to look at what the prophet Isaiah said about what was coming. Isaiah chapter 40. We'll start with verse 3.

[21:38] It says, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley, are valleys high or are they low?

[21:55] They're low. Every valley shall be exalted. Exalted means to bring up, to make high. And every mountain and hill brought low.

[22:06] The crooked places shall be made straight and the rough places smooth. The glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

[22:20] The prophet Isaiah is talking about a future time in which the glory of the Lord will be revealed and the low places, the valleys, will be made low and the high places, the mountains and the hills, will be brought down.

[22:40] And do we recognize, let's actually look at verse 7 too. Yeah, let's just continue on with verse 6. The voice said, cry out.

[22:51] And he said, what shall I cry? This is what he should cry. All flesh is grass and all its loveliness is like the flower of the field.

[23:02] The grass withers, the flower fades because the breath of the Lord blows upon it. Surely, the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of God stands forever.

[23:16] So you see this picture, the breath of God breathing on the flowers and grass and what happens? You know, you might think the breath of life is a good thing, right? Because God breathed life into Adam, right?

[23:28] And that is a good thing. But in this case, the breath of God brings withering and destruction. It takes away the glory of the grass and the flowers. It's talking about judgment.

[23:43] And as we read this verse from the prophet Isaiah in chapter 40, does it ring any bells about somebody specific in the New Testament?

[23:55] the voice of one crying in the wilderness. John the Baptist. Let's look at Luke chapter 3. Sometimes it's hard when you're reading Old Testament prophecies to discern, well, when is this talking about?

[24:16] Is that talking about like one of the judgments that happened already to Israel? Or is this something still to come, future? And sometimes, as we read further, we find out.

[24:31] Oh, the wrong book. What did I say? Luke chapter 3. Verse 3.

[24:45] And he went into all, this is John the Baptist, went into all the region around the Jordan preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. as is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, saying, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight.

[25:01] Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill brought low. The crooked places shall be made straight and the rough way smooth, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.

[25:13] So, John the Baptist is preaching this same prophecy as Isaiah. He's the one saying, hey, the valleys will be brought up and the mountains be brought low.

[25:29] Let's go back just a couple pages to Luke chapter 1. It's interesting, did you all know that Mary was a prophet? Mary, the mother of Jesus, was a prophet.

[25:42] The spirit of the Lord came upon her after she was told about the blessing and the Lord put his words in her mouth.

[25:54] Luke chapter 1 and it says the song of Mary. I don't know, does it actually say that she sung this?

[26:06] The heading says song, but I don't know that it says that she sung this. But she says, my soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior, for he has regarded the lowly state of his maidservant.

[26:18] Again, lowly state. She's in a lowly state. For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed. And that's true, isn't it? For he who is mighty has done great things for me and holy is his name and his mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation for he has shown strength with his arms.

[26:37] He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He has put down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly.

[26:48] So that's where I wanted to focus that last verse that I just read. For those who are high and mighty, he has brought them down or will bring them down. For those who are lowly, he will exalt them.

[27:03] Let's see what Jesus taught. Luke, or this is more prophecy, and this time Jesus is fulfilling this specifically.

[27:15] Luke chapter 4, verse 16, so he came to Nazareth, this is Jesus, where he had been brought up.

[27:26] And his custom was, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to read. And he was handed the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it is written, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.

[27:47] He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.

[27:59] So Jesus was sent to preach the gospel to the poor. Now why would he just be sent to preach the gospel to the poor?

[28:13] Let's look another couple of pages over to Luke chapter 6. This we call, a sermon I guess we can call it, we call it the Beatitudes.

[28:36] Verse 26, verse 20, Then he lifted his eyes toward his disciples and said, Blessed are you, poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

[28:49] Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. Blessed are you when men hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and cast out your name as evil for the son of man's sake.

[29:06] Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for indeed your reward is great in heaven, for in like manner their fathers did to the prophets. Now, who is Jesus talking to?

[29:18] Is he talking to a multitude? He's talking to his disciples. His disciples that are following him, the ones who are close to him, and he's saying, Blessed are you poor.

[29:30] Well, were all of them poor? They were. Well, why were they poor? Because he told them to leave everything behind.

[29:42] Right? I mean, Peter and his brother Andrew were fishermen, so they had jobs. You know, I imagine they were probably good at what they did, provided maybe they weren't wealthy in an extravagant way.

[29:56] But I don't know that they were poor, except he said, leave your jobs behind and come follow me. And we're not going to be staying in a hotel. Right? We're going to live in foxholes.

[30:08] That's where we're going to sleep outside. So, he's saying, blessed are you poor. That's what he called, that's what he called them to.

[30:19] If we look later in James, oh my time, it's going so fast. James chapter 2, verse 5 and 6.

[30:32] James says this, listen my beloved brethren, has not God chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he promised to those who love him? God's chosen the poor.

[30:45] And so, we read throughout the Gospels that people are called to give up their riches.

[30:56] If you are rich, take your money, distribute it to those who have real needs and come follow me. Give up your wealth and riches in this life.

[31:10] The kingdom is coming and when that kingdom arrives, what is God going to do to those who have continued to store up their wealth? He's going to bring them low.

[31:22] The high mountains will be made low. But those, whether they started that way or whether they got this way by getting rid of their wealth, those who are low already, he will exalt.

[31:40] James 1.11 says this, for no sooner has the sun risen with a burning heat than it withers the grass. We read that in Psalm 49. It's flower, was it 49?

[31:53] No, Isaiah 40. It's flower falls and its beautiful appearance perishes. So the rich man also will fade away in his pursuits.

[32:05] That sun rising, you know, the sun brings warmth, right? But in this case, is that what the sun is being used as a picture of, is warmth? No, it's intense heat that causes the grass and the flowers to wither away.

[32:21] And that heat from the sun is something that is used or fire itself, the sun is a great ball of fire, is used to speak about judgment.

[32:34] In Malachi, it says this, Malachi chapter 4, verse 1, for behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven and all the proud, yes, all who do wickedly will be stubble and the day which is coming shall burn them up, says the Lord of hosts.

[32:50] In Matthew chapter 3, John the Baptist talks about, he says, I'm baptizing you with water. There's one who will baptize with fire.

[33:01] He's talking about judgment. He says this in Matthew 3, 12, his winnowing fan is in his hand. winnowing fan you use to make the fire hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter so that you can melt metal, things like gold.

[33:18] And he will thoroughly clean out his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn and he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire. Let's see, because of time's sake we'll skip through.

[33:39] In Revelation, it says this, Revelation chapter 6 verse 15. This is this part of God's judgment when the Lord comes in judgment.

[33:52] It says, the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, and every slave and every free man hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks, fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb.

[34:14] For the great day of his wrath has come and who is able to stand? That's what's going to happen in the last days when, as we know, the tribulation kind of had started to come but then God basically put this whole prophetic program on pause.

[34:33] Push the pause button. But he's going to unpause in the future. Unpause and this time of tribulation will come again.

[34:49] some of these verses we already read. Luke chapter 12 and we'll finish up with this.

[35:01] Luke chapter 12. Luke chapter 12. Verse 32.

[35:22] Luke 12, 32. Do not fear little flock for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. The little flock is a phrase that talks about not just all of Israel but those who are faithful during this time of the offer of the kingdom.

[35:44] He says, not all Israel is Israel. He said at one point. In Romans. I think Paul says that in Romans. But there are people who were faithful during this kingdom offer.

[35:55] Those who are willing to give up their houses and lands. So he says to this little flock for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

[36:06] And then he says this. Sell what you have and give alms. Alms is money to the poor. Provide yourselves money bags which do not grow old. A treasure in heaven that does not fail.

[36:18] Where no thief approaches nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is there your heart will be also. So during this time where the tribulation is happening the kingdom is at hand it's that we live differently.

[36:35] We're not hoarding up our treasures. We're not trying to build wealth. We're getting rid of it all because one the prophet has said that those who are up high will be brought low.

[36:46] We want to we want to be down low right when Jesus comes. So sell all your stuff give it to the poor and maybe you might give it to those who already sold all their stuff and now they're hungry.

[36:59] Right? And then you will have treasures in heaven and this is the kingdom offer. And so just to wrap this up when when Jesus Christ comes to bring in his kingdom you might think you know he's going to conquer all the kingdoms of the world right?

[37:20] And this has happened in the past right? People have conquered other kingdoms and you might imagine somebody who they're part of the conquered kingdom and somebody bigger and stronger comes in and you might think well I'm going to set myself up to be a deputy maybe under this new regime and so I'm going to continue to build my wealth and my power and maybe they'll give me a seat at the table right?

[37:44] If I honor them and that has happened throughout history right? We even see it among the Jews right? Herod who was the king of the Jews he was set up as a as a king but he was under Rome right?

[38:01] He had to abide by all their rules. It will not work that way when Jesus returns. somebody might think well you know he'll take maybe the president of the United States whoever that might be maybe God will make that person maybe Jesus will make that person one of his deputies in the new kingdom.

[38:24] Is that going to happen? No. No. If you are up high you will be brought down low. Who is who is it that Jesus is going to make his deputies?

[38:35] Well the apostles for one the ones who gave up all their wealth and all their land and everything he says I'm going to set you on twelve thrones presiding over the twelve tribes of Israel.

[38:49] I'm going to make you I'm going to bring you up high. I'm going to make you kings sitting on thrones under me. Right? And that's how the kingdom is going to work. God does not want any of man's glory in his new kingdom.

[39:03] If you're going to have glory it's going to be because he gave it to you not because you earned it yourself. So don't hold on to that wealth. Don't try to build up yourself. Get rid of it.

[39:14] If you're going to be exalted God's going to be the one to exalt you in the kingdom. So we're out of time but this is a different time.

[39:25] The age in which we live under the age of grace building wealth is not counterproductive. Now it can be right? Because wealth comes with temptations that others don't have.

[39:38] So we shouldn't put trust in wealth but it doesn't have the same counterproductive results as we see here during this time of the kingdom. So help understanding how things operated during this time helps us to know to compare and then contrast.

[39:57] I had some verses in here from the apostle Paul the apostle to the Gentiles about wealth and he gives warnings about wealth but they're nothing about earning salvation or getting entrance into the kingdom.

[40:12] They're more about just living wisely and that kind of thing. We'll finish up there and I'll take any questions or if anybody has any other comments.

[40:25] Yes, Derek. So if anyone's interested in getting rid of all your wealth, Terry's volunteering for anybody who wants to get rid of all their wealth.

[40:45] John? So in the Old Testament when it talks about the mountains going down, the valleys will come up, he's not talking about literal mountains and literal valleys, he's talking about the people.

[41:00] Well, I will say, so I had a verse, we actually didn't get to it in Revelation, it's talking about the seven seals and these are judgments that are coming on the earth and there's actually a reference to fire coming down from heaven and from islands and like burning the actual earth with fire and it talks about, let's see, I actually have it here, and something like, this is Revelation 8, 8, and something like a great mountain burning with fire was thrown into the sea.

[41:41] I mean, I think there's some literalness there, yeah, so I think there is some literalness to that, but also figurative in a sense, so, yeah, Marvis.

[41:56] I think what you've gone over this morning with how things work during the time of James is going to be exactly what happened during the tribulation.

[42:10] Yes, yeah, so James, he was writing to people who were entering this tribulation, or in really this tribulation period, and this is where a lot of people get confused, well, what happened?

[42:23] Like, are we still going through the tribulation right now? Because there's a lot of things still future, but understanding dispensationally what happened, because of Israel's rejection, this whole tribulation thing got put on pause, put on hold, because God basically took away his plan, his blessing, from Israel and said, I'm cutting you out of the root, cutting your branches off, and I'm going to graft in the Gentiles, and we're going to do this new thing, where we offer grace and peace to the Gentiles, but then when the time of the Gentiles is complete, when God is done doing this work with the Gentiles, that same plan is going to start up basically where it left off, you know, to a certain degree, and that tribulation will start up again, and people in that day will open up the book of James, and hopefully will have the wisdom to open up the book of James and know this is wisdom for us, this is how we ought to live, this is how we need to think and act in our day when that happens.

[43:30] But for us, we need to compare and contrast, and we can get benefit from understanding this, but this isn't doctrine for how we ought to live, the book of James. So, anything else?

[43:44] John? James wrote to the twelve tribes scattered. He did. They were under persecution. Now, were they under persecution because they were believers or because they were Jews?

[44:02] Or both? So, the question, were these twelve tribes scattered abroad, were they under persecution because they were Jews or because they were believers? Like, believers in Christ? That's a good question.

[44:19] Because they were believers in the Messiah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's actually a good thing to consider. What happens with the mark of the beast? You cannot buy or sell whether you're rich or poor.

[44:34] If you're rich, you still can't buy or sell without that mark of the beast. That's coming. So, will your riches help you? No, they won't. So, actually, it's better to sell now.

[44:45] Sell all your riches now. To Terry. So, all right.

[44:57] Terry? Terry? But the mark of the beast is not going to come until after the rapture. Right. Yeah. If you're already saved and you're taken up in the rapture, only the people who are left who then come to Christ, they're going to be the ones who have a real problem.

[45:16] That's right. When the time of the Gentiles is complete, that completion will end with the rapture of the church, the body of Christ. Those who are left will now be under the covenant of law and this kingdom program.

[45:28] And they will need to open up the book of James. They'll need to look at the prophets. They'll look at the things that Jesus said and warned about and take note of all those things and live life according to that program. We will not be here.

[45:41] Praise the Lord. God has called us to peace, right, and not to judgment. By the way, one of the things in reading and understanding all this is to realize how tremendous our blessing is in grace.

[45:55] Isn't grace amazing? It's just incredible. God didn't have to do this. He could have put us under this program. And it would have been right and just and good. but we have this amazing grace that we live under.

[46:08] And I think reading and understanding this helps us to just understand how amazing God's grace is. So our time's up so we'll finish up there. Thanks, everybody. poetry. Knowing It Would About L immens Acc Jah We're Happy Women We… Need Lightning lampsں loads воздуモ naja residents absencehrlich訂 unlimitedyw Québec jo Refer scratches gł minimize voz trumpet deh SuЗЫ cough Opt