Introduction:
A. One day a doctor called one of his patients into his office to deliver some very important news.
1. “I have received the results of your tests and I have some bad news and some good news.”
2. The patient was quiet for a moment, sensing the gravity of the announcement, “Let me have the good news first, Doc,” said the patient.
3. The doctor took a deep breath and said, “The good news is: you have 24 hours to live!”
4. “Oh my goodness,” shouted the patient, “If that’s the good news what could the bad news possibly be?”
5. The doctor replied, “The bad news is: I was supposed to tell you the good news yesterday.”
B. Very few of us live as if there is no tomorrow.
1. Most of us live as if there will be many more tomorrows.
2. Like the popular musical song from Annie – “The sun will come out, Tomorrow…Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya’ tomorrow; you’re only a day away.”
3. And don’t get me wrong, in some respects living as if there will be many tomorrows is good, but in other respects it can be very bad.
4. If we look forward to tomorrow with hope, then that is a fine perspective.
5. But if we look forward to tomorrow with a presumptuous spirit, then we are in danger.
C. As you know from our study of the book of James, James speaks very directly and practically about the challenges we face in our everyday lives.
1. As we come to the end of chapter 4, James addresses the arrogance that we sometimes display.
2. After having reminded all of us that we are not the JUDGE, and that we need to be humble before the Lord, James applies that same spirit of humility to our future plans.
3. He begins verse 13 with a parental, authoritarian tone – “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.” Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be!” (vs. 13-14a)
4. The truth of the matter is – None of us are in control of the future, nor do we know what will happen in the future.
5. It amazes me how much effort and time we spend trying to predict the future.
a. The weatherman has his 7 or 10 day forecast.
b. The talking heads on TV make their predictions about political elections, and the outcomes of sporting events.
c. The NFL season has not even begun, but you can buy magazines that predict who is going to win the Super Bowl.
d. Then there are the daily horoscopes and the psychic hotlines.
e. We want to know the future so badly, that we will pay big money for a glimpse into the future.
6. But James wants to make it clear to us that we cannot know the future.
7. None of us knows for sure what will happen tomorrow, let alone what will happen tonight.
D. Now, before we get too far, let me make this clarification: The fact that we cannot predict the future, does not negate the need for planning.
1. There is nothing wrong with making plans.
2. Being a good steward of our lives necessitates the making of plans.
3. Jesus advocated planning. He told the person who was getting ready to build a building to sit down and figure the costs to be sure he would have enough to finish the project.
4. Jesus told us to plan for the future by laying up treasure in heaven.
5. So, James is not against planning, but he is warning us to be sure to keep God in our plans.
6. Unfortunately, far too many of us plan our lives without God in mind.
7. James encourages us to be thinking, planning and saying, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” (vs. 15)
E. James asks a very important question – “WHAT IS YOUR LIFE?”
1. His answer is: “For you are like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes.”
2. Here is a picture of a teapot with steam coming out of it.
a. When we boil water in a teapot the water turns into steam, but the steam doesn’t usually fill the kitchen.
b. Before it even gets a foot or two away from the teapot it disappears.
c. The vapor appears for a few seconds and then vanishes.
3. The other picture that came to mind is a foggy valley.
a. When I was younger and the trees at Camp Hunt were shorter, we used to see amazing displays of fog in the valley of Hubbardsville.
b. But no matter how thick or heavy that fog was in the early morning, it didn’t remain very long - within an hour or two it was gone.
4. Brothers and sisters, that is our life – we are just a mist, a fog that appears and then a short time later it vanishes.
F. Truth is: Life is short, no matter how long we live.
1. Psalm 90:10 reads, “The length of our days is seventy years – or eighty, if we have the strength; yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away.”
2. And 90 12, “Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”
3. David also wrote: “All my days were written in your book and planned before a single one of them began.” (Ps. 139:16)
a. The good news is that all my days are written in God’s book, but the bad news is we can’t get our hands on a copy of that book!
4. So, King David says the average life is around 70 years, some see 80, but even so, those years go quickly.
5. But none of us are guaranteed to receive 70 years.
6. We cannot bank on 70 years worth of tomorrows.
7. We just don’t know when this day or this moment will be our last.
I. Examples of the Uncertainty of Life
A. I’m sure all of us remember where we were when we heard about the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.
1. I was at the office when Diana arrived with the strange news that an airplane had flown into a building in NYC.
2. I immediately turned on the television and then watched in horror as the rest of the events unfolded.
3. The pictures you see here include a picture of the twin towers of the World Trade Center as they looked before the attack.
4. You see the ominous picture of the second plane as it prepares to collide with the second tower.
5. You can see the shock and terror on the faces of the people running as the first tower collapsed.
6. And the picture of the skyline without the towers and the billowing smoke from the destruction.
7. Now here is the most sobering point for me – no one who boarded those planes and no one who went to work in those towers that beautiful morning had any idea that they would die that day.
8. All of them had plans for the day, or for later that night, or the next weekend, or the next year.
9. But thousands of people went to meet their Maker that day.
10. Our life is just a mist and we never know when it will vanish.
B. On December 26, 2004 a very large earthquake occurred under the Indian Ocean that resulted in a devastating tsunami.
1. Hundreds of thousands of people were caught unaware and were swept away in the ensuing flood.
2. A Canadian couple named John and Jackie Knill of North Vancouver were frequent visitors to that Asian region and were on the beach when the tsunami hit.
3. Their digital camera was recovered in the cleanup and the final images show a sequence of ocean shots as the effects of the tsunami became a reality.
4. Look at this sequence. They, like so many had no idea what was taking place.
5. There they were enjoying a beautiful, tropical Christmas vacation.
6. They went to the beach that morning with no thought that their life would soon be over.
7. Our life is just a mist and we never know when it will vanish.
C. I could go on for hours with example after example from history, but let’s think about the present COVID-19 pandemic we are experiencing.
1. Since we discovered this outbreak of the coronavirus in late 2019, there have been 218 million, 875 thousand, 918 cases in the world, leading to 4 million, 539 thousand, 112 deaths (Wed.).
2. 40 million of those cases are here in our country, and 658 thousand, 102 Americans have died.
3. Our own dear brother, Donn Williams was taken away by COVID.
4. But more recently two of our dear brothers, John Kennedy and Jim Sullivan, have passed away suddenly.
5. Both of them woke up the morning of their last day having no idea it was their last day.
6. Our life is just a mist and we never know when it will vanish.
D. I have officiated at over 120 funerals during my ministry.
1. The oldest person’s funeral I have preached was for the 101 year-old Emily Brundidge, (Bill Vail’s grandmother), and the youngest was for Noah, a 5 ½ week-old boy (my sister’s son).
2. The youngest ones are always the hardest ones.
3. I’ve done far too many funerals for people in their 40s and 50s, including my sister, Sue.
4. Listen again to the words of James, “Now 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.’ Why, 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.” (James 4:13-14)
II. Sins To Avoid
A. So, what should we do about this fact? James tells us that there are three sins that we need to avoid.
B. First, there is the sin of PRESUMPTION.
1. The sin of presumption is an arrogant or maybe not so arrogant display of pride.
2. Presumption may carry itself with a swagger as did the rich fool in Luke 12 who thought he had many years to flaunt and enjoy his wealth.
3. Or presumption may simply be the quiet, understated presumption that motivates many of us, causing us to think we have all the time in the world to do whatever we plan.
4. We must not act like we are the ones who determine our future.
5. We must learn to humbly acknowledge that all that we are and all that we might be is in the hands of God.
C. A second sin is the sin of BOASTING.
1. The Greek word used here has its roots in the characteristic of a wandering quack, which is like the medicine man of the frontier days of America.
2. These quacks offered cures which were not cures and they made promises and boasted of things that they were unable to do.
3. This sin of boasting is based on the invalid assumption that we are able to control our own destiny.
4. Proverbs 27:1 says, “Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth.”
5. How many times have we heard the boasting of young, ambitious individuals.
a. “I’m going to be somebody.” “I’m going to make a million before I’m 40.”
b. The boasting bug can even bite those in ministry: “I’m going to build the biggest church in the country!”
6. James says, “But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” (vs. 16)
D. The third sin is the sin of OMISSION.
1. Verse 17 says, “So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it.”
2. At first glance, verses 17 seems somewhat disjointed from the preceding context.
a. It may refer to all that James has said up to this point.
b. In his commentary, Douglas Moo explains the connection: “James has urged us to take the Lord into consideration in all our planning. We therefore have no excuse in this matter; we know what we are to do. To fail now to do it, James wants to make clear, is sin.”
3. To know a better way and not to live that way is sin.
a. This, of course, is the most subtle sin of all.
4. We know what it is to sin when we do what God has told us not to do – sins of commission, but we are not as inclined to realize that when we don’t do what God has told us to do, this is also sin – sins of omission.
a. A Sunday school teacher once asked her students what the sin of omission is and a child answered, “The sins of omission are the sins we meant to do but forgot to do.”
b. James has been urging us to be “doers” of the Word, not just “hearers” of the Word.
5. Every minute that God gives us to live is a gift, but it is not a gift to be used selfishly, rather it is a gift to be used in service to God and others.
a. We are privileged to serve as God’s ambassadors of love and grace, and we must not fail to fulfill this mission.
6. God has given us His marching orders, and to fail to do what he tells us to do is as serious a sin as to do what he has told us not to do.
III. A Plan of Action
A. Let me bring this lesson to a close by encouraging us to do three things.
B. First, Let’s trust God with our lives and futures, and let’s live one day at a time.
1. Most of us are too young to remember an earlier generation that used to add the initials “D.V.” when writing letters that included future appointments.
2. The initials stood for the words Deo Volente meaning “God willing.”
3. James says we should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” (vs. 15)
4. The Apostle Paul often spoke and wrote that way.
a. In Acts 18:21, he told the church at Ephesus, “I will comes back if it is the Lord’s will.”
b. 1 Cor. 4:19, “But I will come to you very soon, if the Lord is willing.”
c. 1 Cor. 16:7, “I hope to spend some time with you, if the Lord permits.”
5. I’m not arguing that we should literally add these words to every communication we make, but it certainly needs to be the attitude of our hearts and the sentiments of our words.
6. Deo Volente, “God Willing,” is our reality and must be our mindset.
B. Second, Let’s Appreciate the Moment.
1. Let’s not rush through the present while we move into the future.
2. In Thornton Wilder’s play, Our Town, Emily Gibbs, a young mother who had died giving birth is allowed to “go back” to watch herself living one day of her past life.
3. She chose the day of her 12th birthday, fourteen years before her death.
4. With the excitement of return, she sees the town as it had been on that winter morning of 1899.
5. With nostalgia, she watches as her then younger mother cooks breakfast, and as her father, hiding a surprise gift, calls for his “birthday girl.”
6. With wonder tempered by sadness, she softly cries, “I can’t bear it. They’re so young and beautiful. Why did they ever have to get old?”
7. With mounting frustration she pleads, “Oh Mama, just look at me one minute as though you really saw me!…Let’s look at one another!”
8. Sobbing in grief, Emily cries out: “I can’t go on. It goes so fast. We don’t have time to look at one another.”
9. As she asks to be taken away, Emily reflects, “I didn’t realize. So, all that was going on and we never noticed.”
10. Life truly is a vapor that appears for just a little while.
11. Before it vanishes, take notice and take time to thank God for life and for people, before they are gone. Let’s appreciate every moment.
C. Third, Let’s Not Delay Obedience.
1. There is an old fable that tells of three apprentice demons who were coming to earth to finish their apprenticeship.
2. They were talking to Satan about their plans to tempt and ruin people.
3. The first said, “I will tell them there is no heaven.”
a. Satan replied, “Ah, they’ll never believe that. This book of Truth is full of messages about the hope of heaven.”
4. The second said, “I will tell them there is no hell.”
a. Satan replied, “No good. Jesus, while he was on earth, talked more of hell than of heaven. They will know in their hearts that their wrong will have to be taken care of in some way.”
5. The final demon said, “Then I know the answer. I’ll just tell them there’s no hurry.”
a. Satan said, “Go, and you will ruin them by the thousand.”
6. The most dangerous delusion of all is that there is plenty of time.
7. None of us know the day or hour of Christ’s return.
8. And none of us know the day or hour of our own death. We must not delay our obedience!
D. Ultimately, the brevity and uncertainty of life should not cause us to fear, but should cause us to give our lives to Christ and trust Him.
1. We don’t know about tomorrow, but we know about him who holds tomorrow!
2. We need to hold to God’s unchanging hand.
3. Are you not yet a Christian? What are you waiting for?
4. Have you been boasting about tomorrow, or rushing though today, or delaying your obedience?
5. We must not delay, for all we have for sure is this moment to appreciate, this moment to love others, and this moment to obey the Lord.
6. If there is something you know that you need to do or to change, then begin doing it – don’t delay!
7. If we can help you, then talk with me or one of the elders as we stand and sing.
