What is my life? James 4:13-17
The Attorney and the Fisherman
A hard-driving corporate attorney saw a fisherman he knew from church one afternoon, legs dangling off the pier as he helped his two young sons catch crabs. “Why aren’t you out there fishing?” he asked.
“Because I’ve caught enough fish for today.”
“Why don’t you catch more fish than you need?”
“What would I do with them?” asked the fisherman.
“You could earn more money and buy a better boat so you could go deeper and catch more fish. Then you could buy a fleet of boats. Soon you’d be rich like me.”
“What would I do then?”
“You could sit down and enjoy life.”
“What do you think I’m doing now?”, said the fisherman.
—Ray Pritchard, quoted in Men of Integrity, Vol. 3, no. 5.Boasting About Tomorrow
Ah, wouldn’t that be the life? Sitting around on a sunny afternoon by a lake with a line in the water? Or perhaps you have a different picture in your mind what it would be like to be relaxed? But do we live our lives that way these days, just relaxing? I think, for most people in this part of the world, that life unfortunately is too busy to enjoy the simpler things in life. We have a real tendency in North America to spend more time working for today and worrying about tomorrow and how much money we have in our RRSP for the future. We worry about where the money is coming from, and where it has to go once we have it. We complain that we don’t have enough time in a day to get our work done and wish we had more…time or work…we have to choose. We worry and plan about what this year will bring in terms of health, wealth and success.
James has some strong words for those who would boast and brag about wealth rather than follow God’s will for their life. Let’s turn in our bibles to James 4:13-17 and read this passage of scripture.
13Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." 14Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that." 16As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil. 17Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.
Do we realize that we live on borrowed time? What do we get in life, 70 years, 80 years, more if we’re so blessed? Seems like a long time, especially when you’re 7 or 8 years old. But that time goes so fast. It seems that the longer we live, the faster that calendar goes by. Rather than hours and minutes, time seems to be going by in weeks, months, and even years! And how do we often see people spending that time? It’s on how successful they can be, how much money can they make, how much stuff can they own, and comparing themselves to the people next door? How sad really. A life like that is all about greed. Jesus makes it pretty clear in this parable that greed is something to avoid at all cost, because it will cost you everything.
Luke 12:15-21
15Then he said to them, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions."
16And he told them this parable: "The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. 17He thought to himself, ’What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’
18"Then he said, ’This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. 19And I’ll say to myself, "You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry." ’
20"But God said to him, ’You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’
21"This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God."
One thing we need to be clear on here. Nowhere does James say that boasting and bragging about having a LOT of money is wrong. It’s the bragging and boasting that’s wrong. We could be just as guilty about bragging bout $20 as we would be about $20 million. I don’t want us to think that because we aren’t millionaires, that this passage does not apply to us. A person could be bankrupt and still have a problem with desire for money and possessions. It’s the desire for things that corrupts us, not the things themselves.
James calls all that boasting, all that bragging, and all that planning for the future, ‘evil.’ Does that mean it’s wrong to make money, to plan for the future, to store up for tough days ahead? No, we need to have some level of income in order to pay for the necessities of life. Food, shelter, clothing and taxes (kidding on the taxes, they’re not a necessity, they are a requirement) But, if we do these things purely from a selfish motive, of just wanting more and more of anything, then the answer is YES, it’s wrong! Matthew 16:26 What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? What good are things since they have nothing to do with eternity?
People may think that they can make plans for the upcoming year, and all the business that will be done and all the money they will make, but the reality is that there is no guarantee about what may happen tomorrow, or if they’ll even HAVE a tomorrow!
Sure, the AVERAGE life is about 75 years, but that doesn’t mean we’re all going to have that long to live on this earth. Some will have more years, others less; some a lot less. The only guarantee in life is that it is terminal. Life will end. We will all die some day. In Hebrew 9:27 we read that we are all destined once to die and then face the judgement of God. There’s no second time around, no re-incarnation, no better luck in the next life, none of that. We get one life to live, here on earth, then it’s eternity. Eternity is spent with God in heaven, or it is spent eternally separated from Him in hell.
What is my life? James says it’s a mist. We’re here for just a little while and then we’re gone, vanishing into the calendar of time. Kind of like this spray bottle (spray into the air), we are just like that, just a mist. We are here on earth for just a little while, and then we return to the earth. God also put it this way, in Gen 3:19 when He spoke to Adam and Eve about how their life outside of the Garden of Eden would be. He said, “By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return." We have such a short time to really accomplish anything worth anything. The key is what we do with the time we are allotted, and knowing what we should be doing.
So what should we be doing? What is our purpose on earth? Why did God create us? The writer of Ecclesiastes, probably Solomon, wrote extensively on the things of life, and finding most of them meaningless. After writing about the uselessness of everything from money to pleasures he says this in Eccl. 12:13 "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man."
We see this too in what is called the Greatest Commandment: Deuteronomy 6:5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
What are we to do with our lives? We are to love and to serve the Lord God Almighty, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, the Giver of Life, the Lion of Judah, the Everlasting Father. Ask Him what we should be doing with our time, our talents, our finances, our work, our plans, our daily routine. Ask God about what His will for our life is. And ask with the right motives. We talked about that last week. Don’t ask God for what WE want to do, ask what HE wants for us to do for Him.
And if we really listen for God to answer us, He will. It may be through His Word, through a prompting of our spirit by His Spirit, or maybe even by a message you hear given in church. The key is to listen for the answer, because it will come, and He will tell us what to do. We will know it.
And then…when we know it, we must DO IT!
Sins of commission and sins of omission – We know that it’s true that if we do something against God’s commands, we sin. Breaking one of the 10 commandments is wrong. If you steal something, that’s wrong and can be punished. If you kill someone, that is wrong and can be punished. These are sins of commission; we COMIT a sin. It’s something we’ve done. But, if we know what we should be doing for God, and do not do it, we also sin. So not doing something is a sin too. This is a sin of omission. It something we did not do.
Does that mean to say that by not doing something good, I can be held accountable for that just as for something I did that was wrong? Yes! Have you seen that episode of Seinfeld where the 4 main characters are arrested for NOT helping a person who was being robbed? It was called the Good Samaritan law. Because they did nothing to assist the person in distress, they were jailed, judged and found guilty of a crime. It seemed so odd to be punished for something they didn’t do. That’s fiction though. Good Samaritan laws actually protect people from being sued from the people that they are trying to help. Like someone suing their rescuer for breaking their legs while pulling them from a burning car. But does God intend to judge us for things we have NOT done?
I want to close tonight with one of my favourite parables told by Jesus. There are a lot of good stories out there that I and many speakers use as examples for life. But Jesus was the best story-teller of all time, with examples that put God’s values, God’s expectations, in such a clear light. This is the parable of the sheep and the goats. It’s found in Matthew 25 beginning at verse 31.
31"When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 32All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
34"Then the King will say to those on his right, ’Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
37"Then the righteous will answer him, ’Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40"The King will reply, ’I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’
41"Then he will say to those on his left, ’Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’
44"They also will answer, ’Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’
45"He will reply, ’I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
46"Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
What are we doing with our lives? What are we doing with the time we have been given by God? What is our daily schedule filled with? What are our plans and goals? Do they line up with the will of God?
I’m asking all of us to consider what we do in our daily life to serve the Lord and serve others. Take some time this week and ask God to show us how we can make better use of our time and our resources to further His kingdom. And once we know what to do, let’s do it! Let’s make a difference in the lives of those around us, at home, at work and in the community we live.
