Who's in charge of your life? This is the nucleus of today's conversation.
James begins to open the door to some very challenging issues to all of us in the neverending war in our hearts and minds between independence & dependence. James contends with the two most important questions we could ever ask: ➊ Who is Jesus?, and ➋ Who are we to him?
Spoiler: Jesus is not who we think he is—not defined by us. Jesus defines himself to us in scripture. And to him, we are God's beloved children created to be most fully alive by and through our complete dependence on him and his supreme grace and goodness.
Self-dependence or God-dependence: Which is it going to be? The true sign of a Christ-follower is someone who's surrendered to God. Let's unpack this and more in today's message…
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—James 4:13 - 5:1-6 (CSB)—
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.” 14 Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes.
15 Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” 16 But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 17 So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it.
Chapter 5...
1 Come now, you rich people, weep and wail over the miseries that are coming on you. 2 Your wealth has rotted and your clothes are moth-eaten. 3 Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up treasure in the last days. 4 Look! The pay that you withheld from the workers who mowed your fields cries out, and the outcry of the harvesters has reached the ears of the Lord of Armies. 5 You have lived luxuriously on the earth and have indulged yourselves. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. 6 You have condemned, you have murdered the righteous, who do not resist you.
