This evening’s passage may not apply to anyone here tonight because it’s talking about the rich. But the lesson we learn concerns more than having lots of money. We may not think we are rich, but we have more than probably 90% of individuals around the world.
Tonight, we will be looking at James 5: 1-6 as we talk a little about hoarders. In this case, the hoarding of wealth in whatever form it may take. James covers just about all of it and covers every aspect of these riches in these 6 verses.
What is the temptation that so fiercely attacks the rich? It’s usually the temptation to bank and hoard money instead of using it to meet the needs of the desperate and dying in the world. The Bible never condemns all rich persons. Let’s make that clear from the start. It is NOT a sin to be wealthy.
The Bible only condemns the rich who store up their wealth instead of using it to reach the lost, feed the hungry, cloth the naked, shelter the cold and homeless, nurse the sick and in the process, share the news of salvation around the world.
God knows that we are without excuse. That’s the reason for this passage of Scripture—to warn all the rich of this world—all who keep more than what they need in whatever form it may be.
James gives us three summons to consider in this passage. Let’s look at those closely. READ James 5:1. Weep and wail with grief if you are hoarding money. Why? Because of the misery that is coming upon you. James is referring to miseries that are so terrible that you need to begin weeping and wailing now.
What kind of miseries? Miseries of affliction, of emptiness, loneliness, purposelessness, and the list goes on. The old saying that money can’t buy happiness is so true. It most assuredly cannot buy JOY. What James is telling us is that riches that are hoarded will fail a person. They won’t satisfy. This is the summons of God.
READ vv. 2-3. Let’s get into a little more detail with this first summons. That summons is to weep and wail, for wealth is not lasting. Note the three things that James mentions:
1. There is wealth that has rotted. This would refer to such things as farm produce like wheat and vegetables or building products like wood or wallboard. This is referring to wealth achieved through farming and construction or some other industry whose products eventually rot away.
2. There are clothes that become moth-eaten. This would include the textile and clothing industries.
3. There is gold and silver that is corroded or rusted. This refers to mineral, chemical, metal, and mining interests of the economy. James knew that gold and silver doesn’t rust. What did he mean then? He means that if the minerals lie unused, they will become coated over with filth, corrosion, tarnish, and eventually will wear away.
The point is this: if farm produce and building products sit unused, they rot. If textile garments sit unused, they are moth-eaten. If gold and silver sit unused, they will corrode and waste away. That is really a tragedy. To have done nothing but leave the world the material things that age, corrupt, deteriorate, rot, decay, and pass away forever.
READ v. 3 again. Here is God’s second summons. Weep and wail, for hoarding wealth condemns you. Wealth will condemn us in three ways:
1. Wealth will stand as a witness against us. When we hoard money and live extravagantly and lavishly, four persons see something:
a. Every person who is concerned with the desperate needs of this world see that we are living a selfish life.
b. Every poor and needy person sees that we are living a selfish and hoarding life.
c. All others in the world, including those who are rich and hoarding, see that the rich are living a selfish and hoarding life.
d. But most importantly, God sees that we are living a selfish and hoarding life. Sometimes the rich have to fear the poor, for the poor sometimes rise up against the rich and threaten and destroy their lives. But the rich must always fear God more than anyone else. God is the One who can destroy both body and soul to hell.
The point is this: our wealth and hoarding stand as a witness against us even while we are one earth. But the witness that we must fear the most is the witness that will be borne in the eternal judgment.
2. The second way that wealth condemns, as James states, wealth shall eat our flesh as a fire. If we hoard money, the passion to hoard more and more money will burn within us. The more we hoard, the more we want. The passion for more will consume us. We will never be satisfied and fulfilled in life. The fire of passion and lust for wealth will destroy us both now and forever.
3. The third way that wealth condemns is that wealth will be stored up as a treasure against us in the last days. This refers to the days of coming judgment when all men shall stand and give account of themselves to God.
The words hoarded wealth picture working day by day and hour by hour to heap up treasures on earth, and at the same time, the person is hoarding wrath against himself in the terrible day of God’s judgment. Treasures of wealth that are hoarded become treasures of wrath that are heaped up—and it will all fall on the rich person. Why? Because the rich person hoards while a world of needy people die from hunger, cold, disease, and are doomed eternally.
READ vv. 4-6. Here’s God’s third summons. Weep and wail for the way you are living as a rich person. James gives us four descriptions of what he means.
1. Some rich persons cheat, steal, and defraud the workers. The cheated person cries out to God in his suffering. God hears him. God is now referred at the Almighty. The Lord of Sabaoth. God will execute judgment, wrath, and hell upon the oppressors. God will do to those who cheat and defraud the workers and laborers of the world. How, precisely do the rich steal and defraud?
? By not paying just wages.
? Not paying a full hour or day’s wage.
? Not paying for all the work done.
? By withholding more than what they should.
? By adding to the bill the laborer owes for supplies.
? By adding weight to the scales that measure what is being bought.
The list goes on. Scripture has a lot to say about cheating people out of their due wages.
? The person who lies in order to get wealth is a person seeking death. Prov. 21:6 – “Wealth created by a lying tongue
is a vanishing mist and a deadly trap.”
? The person who oppresses the poor is going to meet a day of severe need. Prov. 22:16 – “A person who gets ahead by oppressing the poor
or by showering gifts on the rich will end in poverty.”
? The person who steals to get riches will suddenly die right in the midst of his day. He will prove himself to be a fool. Jer. 17:11 – “Like a partridge that hatches eggs she has not laid,
so are those who get their wealth by unjust means.
At midlife they will lose their riches;
in the end, they will become poor old fools.”
? The person who builds his estate by fraudulent means is warned and shall be condemned. Jer. 22:13 – “And the Lord says, “What sorrow awaits Jehoiakim,
who builds his palace with forced labor.
He builds injustice into its walls,
for he makes his neighbors work for nothing.
He does not pay them for their labor.”
? The person who gets gain unjustly shall be struck by God’s own hand. Ezek. 22:13 – “But now I clap my hands in indignation over your dishonest gain and bloodshed.”
? God will never forget a single one of the dishonest deeds of the rich. Amos 8:4-7 – “Listen to this, you who rob the poor
and trample down the needy!
5 You can’t wait for the Sabbath day to be over
and the religious festivals to end
so you can get back to cheating the helpless.
You measure out grain with dishonest measures
and cheat the buyer with dishonest scales.[a]
6 And you mix the grain you sell
with chaff swept from the floor.
Then you enslave poor people
for one piece of silver or a pair of sandals.
7 Now the Lord has sworn this oath
by his own name, the Pride of Israel[b]:
“I will never forget
the wicked things you have done!
? The person who defrauds the laborer shall face the judgment of God. Mal. 3:5 – “At that time I will put you on trial. I am eager to witness against all sorcerers and adulterers and liars. I will speak against those who cheat employees of their wages, who oppress widows and orphans, or who deprive the foreigners living among you of justice, for these people do not fear me,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.”
2. The second description of living as a rich person, James says, is that rich persons who hoard their money live selfishly in the luxury and pleasure of this world. They hoard and build up bank accounts and estates. They live in the pleasure of big houses, big cars, recreation, power, honor, fame, ego. They seek to live a life of pleasure and gratification, of being recognized and known as being successful and powerful. Proverbs 21:17 notes how a selfish life forgets God and the cries of the desperate and needy of the world. “Those who love pleasure become poor; those who love wine and luxury will never be rich.”
3. A third description that James gives of what he is referring to as a rich person are persons who hoard their money are making themselves fat for the day of slaughter. This is a descriptive language but it’s a warning of God to all of us who bank and hoard more than we need. We are rich in comparison to the poor, needy, and dying of the world. Our hoarding is adding more and more weight for the coming day of slaughter, that is, for the wrath of God’s judgment.
4. The fourth description given is that some of the rich condemn and kill the righteous, and the righteous don’t resist them The one person that the rich dislike the most is the person who teachers self-denial—that we are to give all that we are and have to meet the needs of the world. So, the rich reject and condemn the righteous.
The rich reject the message of self-denial and sacrificial giving that the righteous practice and teach. But James states that the righteous don’t retaliate. They just keep on proclaiming the message of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.
As I stated at the beginning, none of us are rich. But we are in comparison to most people in this world. Preaching and teaching about giving all we have and all that we are is not a popular subject for me to preach. It doesn’t make me very popular with the congregation, yet, it is the example that Jesus set for us all.
We would be wise to heed these words of James.
