1. The first example of greedy pride is hoarding treasures
2. The second example of greedy pride is defrauding measures
3. The third example of greedy pride is indulging pleasures
A story is told about a rich man who was in the hospital on his deathbed. The doctors had only given him a short time to live, but there was something he felt he needed to take care of before he died. But he also knew it wasn’t something he could take care of for himself. So he called his three closest friends in by his bedside. He called his pastor, his doctor, and his business partner. As they all gathered around his bed, the old man began to talk to them about his money. He said, “I know that everybody says that you can’t take it with you. But who really knows? What if they’re wrong?” All his life he had prided himself in preparing for every possibility. Just because he was dying didn’t make that change. So here was his plan. He told his friends, “I’m giving each of you an envelope containing $100,000. After I die, I want each of you to slip the envelope in my jacket pocket at the funeral service. Then if I do need the money in the afterlife, I’ll have it. I’m giving each of you an envelope because you are my most trusted friends.” Well, it wasn’t long until the old man died. Just as expected, each of the three men slipped something into the man’s pocket as they passed by his casket at the funeral. After the service, the three men met up to talk about the parting of their dear friend. As they were talking, the doctor said, “Guys, I have a confession to make. You know with the cost of medicine and insurance and other expenses, my clinic is broke. We desperately needed repairs on our equipment, so I took $20,000 out of the envelope to pay for them.” The others were quiet for a minute. Finally, the pastor broke the silence. He said, “I’ve got a confession to make too. As you know, the church hasn’t been able to make our budget for a while now. We need to start a new mission, but haven’t had the money. I just couldn’t see burying all that money that could be going for the Lord’s work. So I took $50,000 out of the envelope for the new mission.” The businessman looked down his nose at both of them. He said, “I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I can’t believe you would betray our friend’s solemn trust like that. I want you both to know that I placed the full $100,000 in his jacket pocket just like he asked. As a matter of fact, I wrote him a personal check to cover the full amount. When he cashes it, it’s his. Money does funny things to people, doesn’t it? Actually, money doesn’t do anything to people. Money is an inanimate object. It’s a thing. It can’t do anything. It can’t really change people. But what happens is, money reveals who a person really is on the inside. It removes many of the barriers that keep people from acting like they really want to act. From showing who they truly are. From uncovering their innermost self. Over the past two sermons in James, we’ve seen who we really are in our innermost self, haven’t we? Apart from Christ, we are all full of ourselves. That’s called pride. Pride is placing our selfish nature and desires in the place where only the Lord should be. A few weeks ago, we saw what happens when we place our selfish desires above God’s desire. Last week, we saw what happens when we place our personal plans above God’s plan. This morning, we’re looking at the final part of James’ sixth test of faith—the pride test. This third part of the pride test that James covers in our passage this morning deals with our pocketbooks. What a way to start the New Year—talking about money. More specifically, talking about the greedy pride that can come from using our money the wrong way. This morning, I want each of us to avoid greedy pride. I want us to avoid greedy pride by using the resources God has given us the right way. By using them the way that He expects us to. By using them in a way that honors Him. In order to do that, we’re going to look at the wrong way that James highlights in this passage. We’re going to look at three examples of greedy pride. The first example of greedy pride is hoarding treasures. Look with me at verses 1-3:
JAMES 5:1-3
The first example of greedy pride is hoarding treasures. James starts off this part of the pride test the same way he started the last part of it back in verse 13. He says, “Go to now.” He’s basically saying, “Listen up—this is important.” Now, here’s what’s odd. He says, “I want you rich people to listen up.” Remember way back when we started our study in James, we learned who James was. James was the pastor of the local church in Jerusalem. Of course as a pastor, he was a public speaker. Even though speaking styles have changed over the years, certain key principles haven’t. One of those principles is that for a speaker to be effective, he has to know his audience. Do you remember who James’ audience was? Well, the whole reason he was writing this letter was because a large part of his congregation was no longer attending his church. They were no longer attending his church because they had been scattered throughout the Middle East by persecution. Starting with the stoning of Stephen in Acts 7, and Saul’s persecution of the church in Acts 8, the Jerusalem church members scattered for their lives. But James was still their pastor. And as their pastor, he wrote to them. But did he all of a sudden forget who his audience was here? Why in the world would he start this passage by saying, “Listen here you rich people?” How would you respond if I had started my message this morning saying, “All of you rich people need to listen to me this morning.” Most of you would have automatically tuned me out. “He’s not talking to me.” After all, what is the classic definition of a rich person? Somebody who’s got more than me. People who we would think of as being rich don’t see themselves that way. Why? Because somebody else they know always has more. So why would James address these poor scattered Christians as rich men? These people who had lost their homes and jobs and savings through the persecution? These people who many of them had even lost their families? Why would he call them rich? To make a point. See, no matter how much or how little you have, you can still harbor greedy pride. As a matter of fact, I know poor people who obsess more about money than well off people. But to these people that we would consider dirt poor, James says, “Your riches are corrupted. Your gold and silver is cankered.” Why? Because even though they didn’t have much, they greedily hoarded what little they did have. Verse 3 says they heaped their treasure together for the last days. Does that mean that we shouldn’t save money? No. What it means is that we shouldn’t selfishly pile up our money. There is a difference between saving and hoarding. What are you saving for? What are you investing for? Are you saving and investing as a way to bring honor and glory to God? Or are you saving and investing as a way to bring comfort and ease to yourself? Are your purposes self-centered or God-centered. Are you hoarding because you want to live a life of ease and comfort? Or are you saving because you want to plan for future kingdom work? That’s the difference. Saving and investing in order to lay back and do nothing during your waning years is the type of hoarding James is talking about. I’m reading a book by John Piper right now called “Don’t Waste Your Life.” In the book, he recalls a story he read in Reader’s Digest: “A couple took early retirement from their jobs in the Northeast five years ago when he was 59 and she was 51. Now they live in Punta Gorda, Florida, where they cruise on their 30-foot trawler, play softball and collect shells.” Then he goes on to say, “Picture that couple standing before Christ at the great Day of Judgment, saying, ‘Look, Lord—See my shells.’” What a tragedy. What a wasted life. Or as James puts it—weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. How do you plan on honoring God with the money you’ve saved? Or are you just heaping together corrupted, moth-eaten, cankered, rusty treasure? The first example of greedy pride is hoarding treasures. The second example is defrauding measures. Look with me in verse 4:
JAMES 5:4
The second example of greedy pride is defrauding measures. We have all had people trying to defraud us out of money. Whether it’s in person, over the phone or by email, some people make it their business to try to swindle you. A report from last year stated that fraud is second only to drug trafficking in causing harm to the economy and society as a whole. Here’s a clue. No matter how authentic the email or letter sounds, you didn’t win the lottery in Nigeria. Some foreign government isn’t holding the estate of some unknown royal relative of yours. You didn’t win a free vacation in the Bahamas. And nobody is notified of jury duty over the phone—much less do you have to give the person notifying you of jury duty your credit card number. Fraud is serious business. It happens both to old people and to young people. It happens both to men and women. It happens both to individuals and to groups. It even happens to churches. Actually, I might say it happens especially to churches. Hardly a week goes by without able-bodied people trying to defraud churches out of money for gas, food, power bills or whatever. Studies show that only 15% of fraud victims report their losses to authorities. But even though the vast majority aren’t reported, the FBI says that fraud costs people over $40 billion annually. Fraud is serious. And it’s destructive. And God doesn’t tolerate it. Throughout Scripture, God is very consistent in the way He looks at fraud. In Leviticus 19:35-36, God reminded the children of Israel who He was when He forbid them from defrauding each other: “Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, in meteyard, in weight, or in measure. Just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a just hin, shall ye have: I am the LORD your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt.” In those days, they would balance metal weights against grain to determine how much it cost. If the seller wanted to defraud the buyer, all he would have to do would be to lighten his weights. And if that wasn’t good enough for him, he would unbalance his scales a little bit. Either way, God spoke against it. In Deuteronomy 25:13-16, God called that kind of fraud an abomination to Him. He said, “Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights, a great and a small. Thou shalt not have in thine house divers measures, a great and a small. But thou shalt have a perfect and just weight, a perfect and just measure shalt thou have: that thy days may be lengthened in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee. For all that do such things, and all that do unrighteously, are an abomination unto the LORD thy God.” God forbid the people from having two different sets of weights—a true one and a false one. Not only were they forbidden from using them, they couldn’t even have them in their bag or in their house. God’s intolerance of fraud is reiterated three times in Proverbs, including Proverbs 11:1: “A false balance is abomination to the LORD: but a just weight is his delight.” The bottom line is, God hates fraud. But why does He hate fraud so much? Because of all it entails. Fraud includes lying. It includes stealing. It includes either taking advantage of people’s good intentions or their trust. Have you ever defrauded anyone? Have you ever sold something that you knew was not worth what you sold it for? Have you ever presented something as better than it actually was in order to sell it? Have you ever cheated or lied or misrepresented yourself for your own personal gain? Telling somebody that you’re disabled when you’re not, just to get the assistance? Telling somebody that you’re handicapped when you’re not, just to get the parking place? Telling somebody that you’re a senior citizen when you’re not, just to get the discount? What about with your tithe? Malachi 3:8 says, “Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings.” Have you ever slacked on giving your tithe in order to pay for something else? If you have, that is fraud. And fraud is an example of greedy pride. Hoarding treasures is greedy pride and defrauding measures is greedy pride. A third example of greedy pride is indulging pleasures. Look with me at verses 5-6:
JAMES 5:5-6
The third example of greedy pride is indulging pleasures. Does God want us to live without pleasure? Does He want us to live without nice things? No. As a matter of fact, it doesn’t really have much to do with the things in our lives. It really has to do with our attitude toward the things in our lives. Look at the attitude He describes in verse 5. The picture James is painting here is of a beef cow. What do you do with your prize beef cow before you take her to market? You fatten her up. You limit her exercise and make her real fat and lazy. That makes for good butchered meat, but it makes for lousy living Christians. Remember the quote that I read to you from the book I’m reading? The problem wasn’t that that couple retired and moved to Florida. The problem wasn’t that they bought a nice boat. The problem wasn’t even that they played softball and collected seashells. The problem was that that had become their entire life. It was their entire reason for living. What is your reason for living? Is it to honor and glorify God? Or is it some other pitiful indulgence. What do you spend your time indulging in? Is it in service to God and others? Or is it on wantonness? How are you nourishing your heart? With the study and reading and hearing of God’s Word? With worship and singing and praising Jesus? With Christian fellowship and service? Or with feeding your pleasures and lusts and worldly desires? Are you indulging your pleasures or pleasing your Lord? You see, pride shows itself in your life in many different ways. Sometimes it shows itself in your selfishness. It shows itself in the way you war and fight with others because of your selfish lusts and envy. In the way you elevate your selfish desires above God’s desire. Sometimes pride shows itself in your presumptuousness. It shows itself in the way you arrogantly plan your life like you’re the one in control. In the way you place your personal plans above God’s plan. When you think about it, pride is at the heart of all sin. At its core, pride is the essence of sin. It is the essence of sin because it is the ultimate rebellion against God. Pride—whether it’s selfish pride, presumptive pride or greedy pride—is telling God, I don’t need you. It’s telling our only creator and sustainer, I don’t need you. What a slap in the face of Almighty God. But if pride is such a part of everything we as sinful creature are, how do we get rid of it? The only way to get rid of it is to die to it. And the only way to die to it is to have the One who died for you living in you. Romans 8:10-11 says, “And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.” Pride is an inevitable part of life. You can’t escape it and still live. But Scripture tells us that there is One who died in your place. He died to rescue you from your body of death. Jesus not only died in your place, He lives again to give you new life. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” All things can become new for you this morning if you just trust Him. Forsake your pride and cast yourself upon Jesus. Your selfish pride, your presumptive pride and your greedy pride can be nailed to His cross. All you have to do is trust Him. Take yourself off the throne of your life. Invite Jesus to rule and reign there. And when He does, old things will pass away and all things will become new. Invite Jesus to rule in your life today.
