Three little girls are in the schoolyard bragging about their fathers. The first girl says, “My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a poem, they give him $50.” The second girl says, “That’s nothing. My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a song, they give him $100.” The third girl, who we will call Rachel, says, “I got you both beat. My Dad scribbles a few words on a piece of paper, he calls it a sermon and it takes four people to collect all the money!”
Or how about this one…
Two men were marooned on an Island. One man paced back and forth worried and scared while the other man sat back and was sunning himself. The first man said to the second man, “Aren’t you afraid we are about to die.” “No,” said the second man, “I make $100,000 a week and tithe faithfully to my church every week. My Pastor will find me.”
Turn with me to James 5 as we continue our series through the book of James with a message titled The Danger of a Dollar. If you have been a part of LHC for a while, then you know that an important part of our DNA is to preach through books of the Bible, verse by verse, on a regular basis. To use a cliché, it is our bread and butter. We do this because we believe that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable. And we also do this because it provides a well-balanced diet when preaching the whole counsel of God’s Word.
But there is a side benefit as well. When you preach on a subject that people would prefer you avoid, like money, no one can question your motives. We are going to talk about money, not because we are struggling financially (quite the contrary actually) but because is just so happens that’s what’s we’re going to read about in James 5. And the reason we are going to teach through the first half of chapter five this week, is because we just finished teaching through chapter four last week! And as we read the first 6 verses of chapter 5, listen to James as warns us about some of the unique temptations connected to money.
James 5:1-6
Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. 2 Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. 3 Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. 4 Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. 5 You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. 6 You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you.
Throughout this series, James has been challenging us about the genuineness of our faith. And he’s given us a series of tests about whether or not there is a gap in what we SAY we believe and HOW we actually live. He is rooting out hypocrisy in the church. And what I will tell you from all the years of serving in the church, I don’t know if there is an area of life where there is more willingness to live comfortably disconnected from what we SAY we believe and HOW we actually live. Or to put it simply, there is a tremendous amount of willingness to believe that how we view and handle money is not a spiritual issue.
Here’s a little test – if I asked you how you were doing spiritually this morning, would your even think about your finances when taking spiritual inventory? My guess is that most people would think about their Bible reading, prayer life, how often they are sharing their faith, how they are navigating a current trial, how they are doing as a parent, or maybe even some area where they are putting off doing good like we talked about last week. But if I had to guess, very few (if any) people would ever think to take inventory of their money as a part of that self-examination process.
James is helping us with that disconnect this morning and declaring clearly and boldly that there is a spiritual aspect to money. And what he’s leaning into specifically in these verses, is not wealth in and of itself. Very early in Scripture we see the account of Abraham who was incredibly wealthy, but yet he walked with God and was chosen by God to bless the whole world. There is no teaching in the New Testament epistles that condemns owning things or even making a profit. Instead, it’s the misuse of wealth that James is leaning into. Specifically he’s addressing those who were using their wealth for selfish purposes and were persecuting the poor in the process. In fact, he uses some pretty strong language to that end…listen again to verse 1: “Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you.”
Contextually, this is such strong language that it would have caused the original audience to shrink back and ask, “You mad, bro?” And the answer is YES. But it is the righteous anger of a prophet warning people about the dangers of wealth. And just a reminder, if you live in America, you are incredibly wealthy compared to the rest of the world. This is not something to feel guilty about, but it IS a responsibility to spiritually navigate. Nothing wrong with having wealth…the danger is when wealth has YOU.
Three warnings about wealth…
1. DON’T DOWNPLAY THE POWER OF WEALTH – vs 1
Now there is a little debate as to who James is addressing in these verses. And to be honest, the principles he’s giving us this morning are actually applicable to all of us. Now some scholars argue that James is directly addressing Christians within the church? Why, because that seems to be the context in the rest of his letter. Others argue that James is addressing those who have avoided the church all together because they love money too much…those who are both worldly and wealthy.
But I tend to agree with those who think that James is actually addressing a combination of both. He is addressing those that attend the church, but because they are so consumed by wealth that they cannot say with integrity that they are actually part of the Lord’s TRUE church. This is yet another test for those that would profess to be Christians but whose actions are revealing that money is in fact their god.
These six verses are the most blistering rebuke in the entire book of James, and then he starts off verse 7 with the word “Brothers,” a clear term for genuine believers. So I think that means he’s actually addressing those who CALL themselves Christians but are deceived by their own wealth…these are not true brothers or sisters. And he is warning them about the spiritual power that wealth has to capture our the affections of our heart…in other words, the power that money has to become an idol.
And James isn’t the only person in Scripture to give such warnings. Listen to the Apostle Paul in his letter to Timothy:
1 Timothy 6:9-10 (NLT)
But people who long to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And some people, craving money, have wandered from the true faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows”
Did you hear that last part?“…pierced themselves with many sorrows.” That reminds me of the documentary “How winning the lottery ruined my life.” Now as a quick side note – if any of you won the $2 billion dollar lottery this past week, we WILL cash your tithe check. The devil has had that money long enough, Amen?
But we hear these strong warnings from James and Paul and we think, “I promise God – you can trust me to get it right!” We think that a little more money would solve a lot of our practical problems. And because that FEELS true, James is wanting to highlight the fact that money can also create a lot of SPIRITUAL problems. He’s not condemning people who HAVE money…he is condemning people who LOVE money, or the people that Paul describes who CRAVE money.
I have heard plenty of stories of people with incredible wealth who still lived with the thought that their NEXT dollar would be the one that finally satisfied their heart. And while this seems ridiculous to people without much money, I have also seen people with hardly ANY money that were convinced that their NEXT dollar would finally bring them security…or identity…or ________. In both instances, it’s the same lie…that something other than God can satisfy the longings of my heart. And so don’t downplay the power of wealth.
And it’s against this backdrop that we see our next challenge this morning, which is…
2. DON’T DISMISS THE HABIT OF HOARDING – vs 2-3
John Calvin famously said, “Our hearts are idol making factories.” Add in the fact that Jeremiah 17:9 tells us that our hearts are deceitful and it becomes incredibly hard to identify those pesky idols. In fact, in all my years in ministry, I have never met someone that confessed to the sin of greed. We’ve been talking the last two weeks about check engine lights – those attitudes and behavior that warn us to check under the hood of our hearts. So in the context of verse 2 & 3, hoarding is not the problem…rather, it’s the behavior that serves as a check engine light that something is wrong in my heart.
So James gives three descriptions, contextually, of situations where people (two thousand years ago) would hoard things in order to show off their wealth. “2 Your riches have rotted [one] and your garments are moth-eaten [two]. 3 Your gold and silver have corroded [three], and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days.” What are the “last days”? It’s the time period between Jesus’ ascension into heaven in Acts 1 and his return at the second coming (the same age in which we are living). James is basically saying, “If you really believe that Jesus is returning [which should be true of every believer], then why are you not living as if this is true when it comes to how you view your money?”
Now practically speaking, hoarding in the first century looked a little different than it does now. It wasn’t stocks and real estate and bitcoin…but the heart affection was the same. First, there was grain or food that you would store in large bins or silos. Second, there was clothing. In a world where most of the poor only had the clothes on their backs, it was a sign of wealth to have more than one change of clothes. But James says in verse 2, “Your riches [grain] have rotted and your clothes have been ruined by moths.” Third, there was gold and silver. James knew, of course, that these metals are not subject to literal rust. But he is using irony to make a point. When God brings judgment, even these precious metals will be doomed to corruption.
What no one knew at the time was that in a few short years, Rome would destroy Jerusalem and slaughter nearly a million Jews. And James had been warning them all along of the foolishness of hoarding up wealth…wealth that in just a few years would be worthless. And so let me lean into this a little bit this morning. How is this any different than us trying to hoard up money in this life, knowing that it will be worth nothing in the life to come?
I think this is the thought that prompted Jim Elliot, the great missionary that lost his life in telling the Auca Indians about Christ, to write this in his journal: “He is no fool to give what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose.” Randy Alcorn, in his incredible book on generosity The Treasure Principle, addresses the foolishness of living apart from an eternal perspective when it comes to money and possessions.
“Imagine that you’re alive at the end of the Civil War and you’re living in the South, but you are a northerner. While in the South, you have accumulated lots of Confederate currency. Now, suppose for a fact that you know the North is going to win the war and the end is imminent. What will you do with your Confederate money? If you’re smart, there’s only one answer. You should immediately cash in your Confederate currency for U.S. Currency, the only money that will have value once the war is over. As a Christian, you have inside knowledge of a worldwide upheaval caused by Christ’s return where Earth’s currency will become worthless. To accumulate vast Earthly treasures that you can’t possibly hold on to for long is equivalent to stockpiling Confederate money even though you know it’s about to become worthless.”
You may have memorized the great verse in Romans 12:2 that says, “Be not conformed to this world…” Do you know one of the evidences that we can give to show that we are “NOT conformed to this world?” One of the ways is when we live counter-cultural to how the world views money and relationships. The world loves money, and uses people…whereas the Christian loves people, and uses money…money to care for our families, to bless the needy, to further the gospel, and to even enjoy the good gifts that God has given us. But those who are conformed to this world use money and riches as the basis of their value and identity.
But in the gospel, our value and identity comes not from our performance or the wealth we’ve accumulated, but from our position in Christ. And if I believe that, I don’t have to hoard anything, because his supply and provision is unlimited! The promise of temporal riches cannot compare with all that we receive as our own spiritual inheritance with Christ. I am not consumed with getting rich because I am already rich in Jesus.
Let me quickly address two practical questions before moving on to the last principle. The Bible talks a lot about the foolishness of not financially planning for the future. So how do we distinguish between the wisdom in saving and the folly in hoarding? The difference is in our motive. In saving, I am living by faith that God is trustworthy when he says, “Steady plodding leads to prosperity.” Hoarding is the absence of faith. It sees me, not God, as the ultimate source of my provision. Hoarding says, “I can’t trust God to meet my needs” so I have to take extreme measures.
And here is the second question: How do I avoid being one of those people who would never admit to greed even though the Bible talks about it all the time? I have a very clear answer that you are not going to like. Giving is the antidote to greed. If you are worried that you are becoming a hoarder of wealth, it’s really simple… give it away. Hoarders live with closed fists…givers live with open hands. Do you want to think less about yourself and more about Jesus? Do you want to love Jesus more? Then give him the very thing you’ve been hoarding…give him your wealth.
I love Jesus’ words in Luke 12:34: “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” This verse could not be more clear – your heart follows your money, not the other way around. So here’s the hard question that I think we all have to ask: Is our money leading our hearts to King Jesus and HIS Kingdom?
One of the stupid debates I used to get in when I was younger was whether or not the idea of tithing was a New Testament thing or an Old Testament thing. In other words, “Do I still have to give 10% since we are now under grace and no longer under the Old Testament law of tithing?” And what people are REALLY asking when they debate this is, “How little can I give and still keep God happy.” But do you know what the heart abandoned to Jesus says? “It’s all yours, how much do you want me to keep?”
We guard our hearts from the danger of money by breaking through the temptation to hoard it up, by giving it away. And we do so with progressive sanctification in mind. If you are a non-giver or an occasional giver, become a consistent giver. If you are a consistent giver, become a tither. If you are a tither, become an extravagant giver who is more concerned about eternity than you are percentages. And know this – when we teach about giving, it’s not something we want FROM you, it’s something we want FOR you.
Well, let’s look at one more warning about wealth…
3. BE CAREFUL HOW YOU TREAT PEOPLE – vs 4-6
Let me say it again, worldliness is loving money and using people while Christ followers love people and use money to glorify God. And so James gives us some other habits to watch out for regarding using people for selfish gain. Look quickly at verses 4-6: “Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. 5 You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. 6 You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you.”
Notice two ways in these verses that we use people for greedy gain…
• Cheating others – vs. 4
In the New Testament, you worked on a daily basis. You were hired at the beginning of the day, you worked all day, and at the end of the day you were given your check. A man would go into town and hire the workers. There were no contracts or labor unions, no laws to protect workers. If the boss wanted to rip you off, he could. You could work all day and the boss come out and say, “I don’t like your work,” and you went home with no money. It may not look the same, but ripping people off to profit yourself has not gone out of style. If I charge too much or pay you too little because I know you are desperate, if I sell a used car to you and don't tell you about major repairs, if I cheat on taxes, I’m no different than the wicked employer that James is railing against.
Some people would never hurt another person literally…but when it comes to the potential of making a buck, they would come as close to the line as possible. These are the type of people that when the cashier or salesman makes a mistake and they get undercharged they claim it as a sign of God’s favor. Listen, don’t ever put a price tag on your integrity because when it is gone, and everyone knows it, you would spend every dime you had to get it back. That’s why the writer of Proverbs said, “A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches.”
• Exploiting others – vs. 6
For the sake of time, let me just hit this quickly. Verse 6 says, “You have condemned and murdered the righteous person.” Almost every commentator agrees that he is not talking about literal murder, but rather using their wealth and influence to punish others through the judicial system. Evidently in James’ time, the rich were buying off judges and circumventing justice. They were exploiting the poor and their inability to defend themselves legally. Aren’t you glad that people don’t use money to manipulate and control others anymore? So maybe you’ve never bribed an official to swing a court case your way…but let me give you a very practical example of how I see people using money to exploit others all the time. In high school and college, both of my daughters made their fortunes in the retail industry. And they were forever mistreated by people who basically said, “I’m the paying customer, and therefore I can treat you like dirt. And don’t you dare push back on me, or I’ll call the manager.” And do you know what? I expect this from the world, but I have seen more than one of my Christian friends treating a 17-year old cashier at Target or Chick-fil-A like crap. And they couldn’t do anything about it.
And do you know why we do this? “5 You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.” It’s self-indulgence to the point where I am willing to cheat, punish others, or act like a demanding fool in order to get more for myself, because I love money and I’m willing to use it to trample on others to feed my fattened, self-entitled heart.
Money is not evil, it is amoral. Money doesn’t change our hearts, it reveals our hearts. It’s not sinful, but it is dangerous. But the good news is that Jesus isn’t just good for rescuing us from hell someday…he can rescue the affections of our hearts in the meantime. The best precaution against the warnings about wealth, is to place your heart in his hands.
