Let's get after it. It's ready to go. Super Bowl Sunday. And I'm, well, not. I wasn't cheering about that, but, hey, I mean, I'm. I'm. I'm game for that as well. I've just gotten beat up by this text for the last two weeks, and I'm eager to now give the beating. So I want you to, like, I'm with you. This text is heavy. It's beautiful, it's hard, it's good. And I'm just, like, studying this, have just been taking it, like, all right, now let's go. Let's do this together. And I would say that this text may be the sweetest closed fist punch in the face that you'll ever get. And I really believe that what's in this text is the makings of revival. And how sweet would it be for God to do something, like really special and unique kind of outpouring of his spirit to us, of kind of awaking us to who he is in new ways. And what we have to realize is that revival is not just something that happens out there. Like, as soon as this person gets elected or as soon as this gets changed in a school board or as soon as this. That's revival. No revival starts in the church. When the people of God wake up to the glory of God. And I hope, like, today? Could that be today? Could we kind of be awakened to what God wants to do? And would revival start here? Does that sound like, are you excited about that potential, or is it just me? If it's just me, it's fine. But, I mean, it's okay. You're going to cheer now and then. It's like James gets in the name calling twice, and you're like, I want to take my clap back. I didn't know you were going to say that. But our hope is, like, God, please awaken us from kind of a lukewarm existence of Christianity in this. So if you got your bibles, turn to James, chapter four. James, chapter four. We're going to see some ingredients for revival here. And James has been, as you're turning there, James has been referring quite a bit to his audience as brothers. Just a glance. It's not too hard to see. Counted all joy, my brothers. Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation. Do not be deceived, my brothers. Know this. My beloved brothers, chapter two. My brothers, show no partiality down to verse 14. What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith? This has been like a constant pattern throughout the book of brothers, brothers, brothers. And then you get this hard left turn that we saw last week when he's like, you adulterous people, right? And then he's like, if you're a friend of the world, you're an enemy with God, and you kind of like, whoa, James, tell us how you really feel. Like that was a turn, because I thought we were brothers, and then you come out name calling like that. And nowhere in scripture are christians or brothers referred to as enemies of God. So who are we talking to here? Are we talking to brothers and christians? Are we talking to enemies of God and adulterers? Yes. For me, who am I talking to today? Do you think everybody in all three services is a genuine, born again, regenerate follower of Jesus Christ? Or are some people just here and they've just been here for a while and they're just kind of going along with the show? And so James is addressing both those kinds. In fact, from the beginning of this book, he's been constantly kind of contrasting true faith with false faith. From chapter one, it's like, let me tell you how true faith handles trials. True faith rejoices in trials. Let me tell you how true faith handles temptation. Let me tell you how true faith responds to God's word. We're not just hearers of the word. We're doers of the word. Let me tell you how true faith treats hurting people, specifically widows and orphans. Let me tell you how true faith cares about purity, not wanting to be unstained from the world. And then you get into chapter two. It's like, let me tell you how true faith doesn't show favoritism. Let me show you how true faith produces works, which really is kind of the crescendo of his argument, when he's like, faith without works is what? It's dead, right? So you get alive faith or dead faith or true faith or fake faith, however you want to say it. But he's been doing this contrast, and then you get into chapter three. It's like, let me tell you how true faith affects even your mouth and the taming of your tongue and how you speak. And let me show you how true faith grabs hold of a wisdom that's from above that shapes all of life. So he's been contrasting kind of true faith and fake faith, which kind of pushes or thrusts the question upon us, do you have true faith? Like, do you have this genuine saving faith? Or have you just kind of been going along with emotions? Because let's be real, James is out to convert church attenders. He's like, you may be here, but you're not here. Right? And you may be here, but you're not here. And just to be honest, in a room this size, there's some of you that are here, but you're not here. And you're here, but you're not here. And my hope is, like, could today be the day where the lights come on? There's a spiritual awakening. Like, I get it. I see my sin. I see God's holiness. You go from death to life. Maybe it's today. Or maybe it's like you've kind of lived in this lukewarm Christianity and you kind of get woken up to the holiness of God and how your life should be all in for him, that all of life is all for Jesus. Could that be today? I'm hoping that this text kind of does that in our lives. So let's get into it. We just got four verses. Six, seven, 8910, five verses. My math is not strong. We're going to start with verse six. Here we go. But he gives more grace. Now, it's unusual to start a section with a conjunction. He's contrasting something. We're just jumping into it. What is he talking about? So we understand the context is before there's an accusation that you're an adulterous people, that you're being unfaithful to God and that you're a friend of the world. It makes you an enemy of God. Yet God is still jealous, or he yearns for what is his. You are his. Your worship belongs to him. And now James is getting into. So how do you recover from spiritual adultery? So that's true, but. And then he goes on. He gives more grace. How do you recover? Like, you got too friendly with the world. You started to kind of follow the world's ways, the world's systems. You look like the world. You celebrate with the world. Whatever's popular in the world is popular with you. You kind of bought into that. And now James is kind of calling us out, and then he's getting into the remedy. Like, what's the solution? What's the rescue? How do you recover from spiritual idolatry? And the answer is in that first section. What is it? It's grace. He gives more grace. He gives grace like, we get grace. And that's awesome. We love grace. Let's pray. Go home. Please don't say anymore. Right, wrong. As he says some more, we need to pause, slow down a little bit, and ask some more questions, like, who does God give this grace to, like, look at the rest of verse six. But he gives more grace. Therefore, it says, God opposes the proud, but he gives grace to the what? Humble. So he's saying there is a pride, an attitude of, like, I run my life. I decide what's right and wrong in my life. I'll be in charge of me kind of pride. That's like, yeah, that's not a recipient of grace, but the humble. The humble does receive grace. So are you humble? Are you this type of humble? I mean, are you the type of humble that lays hold of the saving grace of God? How do you know? What does that type of humility look like? Because humility is a driving emphasis in these texts. In fact, he starts with it and he ends with it. Look at verse ten. He says, humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you. So humility is promoted in verse six. Like, this is the way that you find grace. And then humility is actually commanded in verse ten. It's like, this will lead to your future exaltation. So humility is seen as a good thing. But what exactly is humility? So you got this humble sandwich, or it's bookend with a talk of humility, and then you got three verses in between there. And that's where James unpacks what he actually means when he says humility or humble, he's going to describe it to us. He's like, this is what I mean when I call you to be humble and as if you're a spiritual adulterer, that you've been unfaithful to God, that you've kind of fallen in love with this world. He's saying, here's the remedy. Here's the solution to that. So let's get into this verse seven. Here we go. Submit yourselves, therefore, to God. Now, we don't like that word submit, do we? It's this idea that I'm not in control, someone else is calling the shots. There's kind of a reaction against that. We're not seem to be too friendly with that word. Submit is to line up under the lordship of God. You're God, not me. You're in charge, not me. You call the shots, not me. He's called to submit to the lordship of God. Now, notice there's not, like, neutral ground here in the passages before this is like, hey, you're a friend of the world. You're an enemy with God. You can't be like, no, I'm with God. We're just friends. It's like, no, that doesn't count. And not only are you a friend of the world, you're an enemy with God. The step he calls you to is submit to the Lord. Submit to the lordship of God. That's the step. If you want a remedy for this spiritual adultery, it's not, hey, you were friendly with the world. Start to be friendly with God. No, it's total surrender. It's submitting to the Lord, your God. Because listen guys, Christianity is not a pick or choose religion. So I like this, I don't like this. I'm for this, but I'm not really for that. It's not on your terms. That's the pride that God opposes. You think you can put it on your terms? Your salvation is not a negotiation situation. Right? Well, I can agree to this, but I can't agree to this. I can agree to this, but I can't like, no, it's total surrender to the Lord as lord. And it's seen in your submission that Jesus Christ is Lord and savior. Now we love the savior part. Let's talk more about that. Like, yes, please on the saving. But what about the Lord part? Is he your lord? Do you see Jesus as your authority? Do you see his word, his word as your authority in your life? He's going to keep going. That's just the beginning. It gets even tougher and weirder. Submit yourselves therefore to God. And then he says this, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. It's a little bit like you can't just name drop the devil and just move on. That's kind of odd. Now it may not be od to you. I think for a lot of the world it's like, I understand talking about God. I'm at church, I get it. But to just kind of mention the devil in a flyby, that can seem a little od. Now I don't want to surprise anybody. We believe in God. We believe in the Bible. We believe in the spiritual world. We believe that angels exist, we believe that demons exist. We believe that the devil exists. And we believe that our fight in this world is not just against flesh and blood, but there are spiritual realities at work in this world. In fact, there's three main fronts in this spiritual fight. The flesh, the world, and the demonic, the devil. In fact, James mentions all of these actually twice in these sections. But in chapter four it starts off with what causes quarrels and what causes fights among you. Is it not this that's your passions that are at war within you. He's talking about your flesh, like you got your own sinful desires. But then he goes on and he says, if you're a friend of the world, you're an enemy with God. So he goes from flesh, he brings in the world, and now he's talking about the devil, right? He's kind of showing all the fronts of this spiritual warfare. You got your own flesh, you got this world systems, and you have the devil. Now, I think we can be somewhat familiar with our own internal sin struggles. Like we've. Like, I don't want to do that and I do that and I struggle, and we can be very familiar with the corruption in our world. It just kind of seems like this is anti God in our world, but we're often very ignorant when it comes to the spiritual realities that we face. In fact, this is what Paul says in two corinthians, the end of chapter two. He says so that we would not be outwitted by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his designs. Could you say that? Could you say that? Or would you be easily outwitted because you are ignorant of his designs, his schemes, his plans? I think we should talk more about spiritual warfare, but we're going to get to some basics in this text, like it's there. If you pay attention, you'll be able to connect the dots. We're not going to dive into it, but it's there if you're listening. Now, James doesn't say resist the devil because he's of no threat to you and he can't do anything but resist him. No, he's saying, resist the devil because he's alive and active and a legitimate threat. He's a liar, he's an accuser, he's a deceiver. He's described as like a roaring lion prowling around looking to devour somebody. He's talked about having schemes and plans. He's saying, resist the devil. But the pushback that James is saying is, I'm not seeing a lot of resistance, I'm seeing a lot of cooperation, I'm seeing a lot of you just going along with this world, thinking you're innocent, not seeing the spiritual realities underneath it. I'm seeing that, but I don't see a lot of resistance. And that's the idolatry that he's talking about now. You just go right along with it, you just jump right in. You're just ignorant of the demonic underneath it and you just cooperate with it. So James shifts from talking about the flesh to talking about the world to talking about the devil, because we need to see the connection. In fact, here's how he does it at the end of chapter three, if you look at verse 14, but if you have bitter jealousies and selfish ambition in your hearts. So he's talking about your own sinful desires that live in your own hearts. Do not boast or be false about the truth. That is not wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly or worldly. Like that. Your sin in your heart lines up with the sin in this world. It's earthly, unspiritual, demonic. It's like, oh, you got pretty dark fast. I mean, you're just talking about, yeah, we all have sinful desires. Yeah, I understand the world's corrupt. And then you went demonic really quick, like, that was a hard turn. But James is wanting us to see the connection. I'm telling you, church, your unchecked sin or your unchecked sinful desires, they lead somewhere, like in ephesians four when he says, don't let the sun go down on your anger. Why not? Because it'd give the devil a foothold. Like, you don't deal with the sin in your life, anger or whatever. It's like you're opening a door for darker realities to deal with in your life. It's like there's a connection there. Or if you just go along with the world's values, it leads somewhere. It's not just the world. Like there is demonic under the world, connected to the world. In fact, I don't think a lot of you will. Maybe some of you will remember not our finest moment, but a few years before I went to ASU, there was a national news of a point shaving scandal that happened. There were some players on the team, point guard and another player that connected with some students to play some bets. And they weren't going to throw games. We're still going to win games, but the games we should win by a lot, we just won't cover the spread, and we'll win by less. And they made a lot of money. And they were thinking, me and some other friends are just making some bets to make some money. But what they didn't realize is the mob was involved in that. And the darkness or the evil that they were tethered with was a lot deeper than what they thought. And I'm telling you, you don't just look at porn. You don't just make your life about greed and making money. You don't just cover your neighbor's car. You don't just express a bunch of jealousy, like there is demonic realities underneath that. Or let me give you a more controversial one, you don't just miss church every other weekend for a volleyball tournament. Those are driven by worldly values. And underneath worldly values are demonic realities. And that's what James is trying to help us. It's like, no, no. You may think it's not just a big deal, but I'm telling you, it's not just earthly, it's unspiritual, and it's demonic. And it's not just the flesh in your heart that's waging war. It's a whole worldly system and it's connected to the devil. Like, you see how he's getting darker each time here? He's wanting us to see that. You tracking with me? I just weird you out, okay. Three of us are with her. So he's telling you, like, are you resisting? Is there any pushback? Are you just kind of going along? If it's popular, it's popular in my house. If everybody's watching it, I'm watching it. If everybody's wearing it, I'm wearing it. If everybody's doing it, I'm doing it, that kind of stuff. And you think, well, that's not demonic. And James saying, yeah, it is. Yeah, it is. I'm not seeing any kind of. You're not uniquely christian. You look like everybody else. You're just kind of going along with things. And you may think it's just worldly, but it's demonic. You may think it's just your flesh, but the devil is at work behind this, and he see the weightiness of this. So are you resisting? And I'm telling you, resisting is not just about saying no, it's more about saying yes. Look at next part of verse eight says, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Draw near. Now, throughout scripture, especially in the Old Testament, and James has drawn a lot from the Old Testament, but this idea of drawing near to God is this idea of worship. So to draw near to God in the old Testament, you would go to the temple, you would bring your offerings, your sacrifices. There is a holy of holies. A priest would go near. It's about being near to God, and God doesn't want to be near to his people. So this draw near is about bringing up worship. So James is saying, recovering from your idolatries or your adultery is not just about ending your inappropriate relationships with the world, but also fostering your relationship with God. And they're connected. Like, don't make these two separate things. I should resist the devil and I should draw near to God. He's saying, no, you want to know how to resist the devil? Draw near to God. That's the activity of resisting the devil. It's connected. And, guys, listen to me. We should be more aware of the spiritual reality and the spiritual warfare that exists. But there is a reason we don't get a lot in the scriptures about it. I mean, you're making a theology about that by grabbing a handful of passages. There's more than a handful. But you're kind of taking this and taking this and taking this and trying to make a theology about it. And there is a reason that we don't get that much about it in the scripture. And don't forget, in the Garden of Eden, what got us in trouble was this desire for the knowledge of good and evil. And they already had the knowledge of good. God made it and said it was what good? And God is good. And they walked with him. But they're like, that's great. I would like to know more evil. I want to understand more of this. I want to get this. And that's what got them in trouble. So don't be ignorant about the realities of the demonic world, but also don't be obsessed. Don't be obsessed. Here's what James is telling us. The best defense against demons is a greater connection with God. Pursuing God is spiritual warfare. Worshipping is spiritual warfare. Praying is spiritual warfare. Reading your bible is spiritual warfare. I mean, you look at the armor of God in Ephesians six. So in Ephesians six, he's like, you better suit up, right? Because our battle is not just with flesh and blood. You better put a helmet on this. He kind of goes through the armor. It's like the belt of truth and the shield of faith and the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. And there's more than that. But he's like, you got to suit up. And the reason you got to do that is what he says is to stand against the schemes of the devil. So he's got schemes, and you need to stand against them. But when you look at the aspect of the armor of God, every one of them has to do with being wise to what is good, not being more informed to what is bad. Amen. Right? He said, that's the spiritual warfare that we need to be informed. Listen, we'll just draw it back to kind of an earthly understanding. If you want to protect your marriage from adultery, then don't be texting another man or woman one on one. That's not wise. Don't go out to work meetings, just one on one lunch. That looks like dates. That's not wise. But hear me, that is not a replacement for fostering a loving marriage with your spouse. The best defense is a good offense. Invest in that relationship. Date your wife. Write her love notes. Right. Don't just put things we don't do do things you do do. And what James is saying is like, you need to invest in your relationship with God. You need to draw near to God. He's saying you've fallen in love with the world because you have not been drawing near to God. You're not singing, you're not worshiping, you're not praising, you're not reading your Bible, you're not praying. Like, you're not doing these things. And it's opening up your heart to be vulnerable, to fall in love with the things of this world. So you want to resist the devil, pursue God, draw near to God. And he goes on, he says this, cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double minded. So James is not pulling any punches. Like, he's name calling, and it would be good for us to feel it. What I mean by that is don't hear that. When James is like, cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double minded. Don't hear that. And too quickly think, oh, he's not talking to me. Like, hear these words, because this is for our good. And there are important things, eternal things at stake. So resisting the devil means drawing near to God, and drawing near to God means repenting from sin. Now, James doesn't use the word repent, but he describes it. Cleanse your hands, purify your hearts. Like live holy. That's what he's talking about. I don't think we talk about repentance enough as a church. I mean, it's not a fun topic. I mean, probably even with your friends, your connection group. I don't know if it's a topic that comes up enough. It's not a fun topic. It's a needed topic. It's an important topic. But when an important topic doesn't get brought up, it's not good for us. And we love to talk about Grace. Grace is awesome. We love Grace. This idea that there is grace for our sins, that I'm not accountable to, that there's forgiveness. Yes, please, let's talk more about that. But this idea of talking about not sinning, that's not fun. I mean to say, like, listen, if you're looking at porn, stop it. If you're lying to your spouse, stop it. If your life is all about greed and just making more money, stop it. If you're just coveting what your neighbor has or what your friends have that you don't have, stop it. If you constantly dress in a way to draw people's attention to yourself and your body, stop it. And you hear that and you might get uncomfortable because, like, oh, we're getting all moralistic here. We're getting into morality. Don't do that, Jake. Just preach the gospel. Just preach the gospel. Preach grace. But here's the thing. James is talking about grace. That's what he's talking about. What does he say? But he gives more. What? Grace. Therefore, it says God opposes the proud, but gives what to the humble. So you can't talk about grace without talking about humility. I mean, that's what the connection that James is given here. We shouldn't talk about Grace without talking about humility. I mean, to think that you can get the grace and forgiveness of God and you don't have to repent. Like, who do you think you are that you can create the terms of this salvation, that you can decide what rules you think are good and what rules you think are bad, what rules you want to follow and what rules you don't want to follow. That sounds like pride. That sounds like the kind of Pride God opposes that doesn't have access to this grace? We need to talk about grace. We should talk about grace, but not without humility. You want grace? Repent. Cleanse your hands, sinners. Purify your hearts. Double minded. There is grace for you. Repent. Find it. But where do you get this idea in all of scripture that there is any grace for you without mean? That's what James is addressing here, this double mindedness. Like, you don't get both. You don't get God and this love affair with the world. Now, some of you, let me just address the glares. Some of you might be thinking, wait a second, Jake. If we have to do anything for it, it's not grace. But what's the analogy? Adultery. This broken kind of love relationship between two people. And if you cheat on your spouse and you say you're sorry, does he or she have to forgive you? No. But if he or she does, what's it called? Grace. And do you think there's any hope of reconciliation without confession and repentance of the affair. We need to better understand repentance. We need to know what repentance looks like. It is both a cleansing of the hands and a purifying of the heart. Or in other words, it is repenting in both a practical, tangible way and an emotional way. There's an external aspect of repentance and there's an internal aspect of repentance. You can't just say, I feel really bad about doing that. I feel terrible and keep doing it. That's not repentance. Nor would you have the attitude of like, you want me to stop? Fine, I'll stop. But I don't see what the big deal is. That resembles no call in scripture of what repentance should look like. If you don't see what the big deal is, that's a big deal. In fact, look what he says next in verse nine. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Now, he's not saying that the christian life is one defined of just by depression and poor me and lament all the time. In fact, that would go against the predominant expression in scripture of the joy of our salvation and walking in joy and peace. The fruit of the spirit is joy, not sorrow. But what he is saying is, I think you're all acting pretty happy when you shouldn't be because you're not wrecked by sin that's ruining your life and running your life. He says, you got to hate sin. You got to hate it. You can't tolerate it. You got to have a disgust for sin. And I know you're like, brought my friend Jake. Usually you're more funny than this. There's just like really weighty stuff in this text that I want to be faithful to. I mean, when James says, be wretched and mourn and weep, let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy to gloom. What is he getting at saying? Listen, a sign of spiritual adultery is that we take sin far too lightly. Christ died for our sins. They're serious. And we spend time defending sinfulness in our life in the name of freedom. Oh, no, I'm free. I can do this. It just shows that what I really want is to be as close to sin as possible without crossing the line, not close to God as I can be. We entertain ourselves with sin. Things we watch, things we listen to, things we read freely like it's no big deal. We laugh at sin when it's not funny. When Christ died for it, we're like numb to sin like it's so common. It's all around us. It stopped bothering us. And guys, it's one thing to hate sin in this world. Like, I hate the corruption that's in our government. I hate the wickedness that's happening in our world. It's a whole other ballgame to hate your sin. My lust, my greed, my insecurities, my pride, my jealousy. And I get it. There's like an enticement to it. That's what sin does. It kind of deceives us and lies us. And there's an enticement to it. But when it gets the best of you, do you hate it? I mean, do you hate it? Does it break your heart? Is this true for you, that you would be wretched and mourn and weep? Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy to gloom? Does that speak of you when it comes to your sin in your life? And here's the thing, guys, don't miss this analogy because it helps us understand the heart of what James is getting at here. It's adultery. It's the breaking of this loving relationship. So real repentant sorrow over our sin is not primarily a frustration with yourself. Can't believe I did that again. I'm not going to do that again. I'm better than that. I'm going to get this. A real repentant sorrow is not primarily feeling bad that you hurt somebody you care about. Real repentance, sorrow is primarily a broken heartedness that you offended your God, your creator. And I think we understand the action of repentance. You're doing something you shouldn't do, don't do it. But I don't know if we understand the heart of repentance that we would be broken over our sin, we would weep and we would mourn over it. Because if you don't weep and mourn over your sin, it's a window into a heart that may be off. It shows that you're not just wanting to be good, you're wanting God. And there's a big difference between the two. A lot of people want to be good. Not a lot of people want God. And you can be frustrated yourself when you're not good, you're not good enough. You're not as good as you wanted to be. But that is very different than wanting God and wanting to honor God and not offend God. There's a big difference. There's a heaven and hell difference. Guys, I want you to get this because this is where I think we tend to go wrong. And I really believe it's a game changer. When we think of sin, we tend to think in terms of right or wrong, good or evil, in or out? Right. Is it right or wrong? Is it good or evil? Am I in or out? But that's not helpful. I don't even think it's the most biblical view. I think it would be better when we think of sin to think of in terms of far and close. Far and close, because God is the prize. God is the prize. And in his presence is the fullness of joy. And at his right hand, close are joy forevermore. And when Christ says, abide in me, be close to me, be connected to me, and I will fill your. Like. Your joy is incomplete. I'm going to fill it with my joy. Right. And judgment is being cast away from the presence of God. Now I get it. Theology like God is omnipresent, and even away from him, you are in the presence of his wrath. All right, but the analogy in scripture is that away from God, bad, close to God, good. I get this because this is the paradigm shift. Our sin hurts closeness to God. That's what it does. It's not just a right or wrong thing, a good or bad thing, an in or out thing. Our sin hurts our closeness to God. It hurts our intimacy with God. And we have to be people who crave closeness to God. Like, more than anything else, I just want to be close to my savior. I just want to honor my savior. I want to walk with intimacy with my savior. Like, more than anything else, I want to be close to God. True faith wants God. True faith sees the beauty of God. True faith sees God as better than anything this world has to offer. And who wouldn't want God to be close to God? Are you kidding me? The maker of this universe and to know him intimately. Who wouldn't want God? Who wouldn't want God more than that cabin on a lake stocked with trophy, musky fish? Who wouldn't want God more than that four bedroom house on six acres? Who wouldn't want God more than that new kitchen? Who wouldn't want God more than being the person playing in the big game today, scoring the winning touchdown and having everybody scream your name? Who wouldn't want God more than a bank account big enough to fly to Tahiti whenever you want to do right? I mean, James is calling these first century believers out of spiritual adultery. Resist the devil. Resist your own flesh. Resist the systems and values of this world. Draw near to God. But, guys, you've got to get this but the way that he does it is he does in this way. It's like, look how attractive the God is that I'm calling you to be faithful to. Do you see how beautiful and awesome this guy? Because this is a hard text, right? I mean, he's already been name calling twice. There's been some heavy blows thrown. Like, this is a difficult text. And yet there is amazing truths in this text. There's four incredible, incredible promises in this text. God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. Are you kidding me? In humility, we would receive grace and forgiveness from God. That's amazing. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. That's an amazing promise. That this roaring lion, like when we stand in Jesus name runs, that he was in us, is stronger than he was in the world. That's incredible. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Are you kidding me? If I take my pathetic baby steps in God's direction, he comes running towards me to have fellowship with me, to have relationship with me. Just mind blowing. And then to humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you. What an incredible promise. That there is a future hope that fuels present repentance. Why do I turn from sin now? Because I got something so much better waiting for me. Like, he will exalt me. What an incredible promise. And if we are the adulterers we are, we've committed spiritually adultery to God. Can you believe repentance is even possible for us? Somebody asked me how it's possible. Grace. Grace. And this grace is given to those who humble themselves and submit to the lordship of God and resist the devil and draw near to God and repent of their sins and weep and mourn over their sins. And you may be hearing that, it's like, yeah, that sounds great, but is there enough of it? Because you don't know where I've been. You don't know what I've done. You don't know how long I've done it. I'm too much of a mess. Let's look at. Go back to verse six. I told you we'd get back here. But he gives more grace. I want you to circle that word. More. More of what? He didn't answer that. The context does, but he says he gives more grace. More of what? More of your. Than your sin. God is a greater savior than you are a sinner. Listen to me. It doesn't matter what you've done, where you've been, how long you've been doing it, God's grace is sufficient for you. It's sufficient for you. In fact, some of your translations may say a greater grace, because that word more in Greek is megas. It's where we get our word, mega. So what James is saying is God gives a mega amount of grace. He gives an extraordinary amount of grace, like a spouse who has been cheated on, her heart has been broken, and yet she still says, I forgive you, I love you, and I still jealously yearn for relationship with you. But it's even more than that, because God is not a fellow sinful human being. He is a perfect, holy God. And yet in his grace, he looks at us and he says, I love you, I forgive you, and I still jealously yearn for relationship with you. How awesome is our God? In this short section, there's ten commands, there's four amazing promises, two name callings. But let me sum it up for you. Hate sin, love God, find grace. Hate sin, love God, find grace. And perhaps the newest aspect of that is the first part. Love God. Great. Find grace, would love it. Do you hate sin? Do you hate your sin? If to get a better grasp what James is saying, you could put it like this. Passionately hate sin, wholeheartedly pursue God, find mega grace and church. This is the stuff of revival. This is stuff of revival, like, when we. And not what this world is doing, but when we get serious about our relationship with God, when we get serious about hating our sin, when we go before God, it's like, I am the adulterer. I am sorry. Please forgive me, have mercy on me. And we find the refreshing grace of God. So when we take communion, why is it such a violent memory? Have you ever think about that? Why is the memory of Christ's sacrifice meant to be so violent? It's like, this is his body. It was pierced and broken on our behalf. This is his blood. Like, why is it so violent? Because in this remembrance, we remember how serious sin is, how serious your sin is, how costly sin is. And I hope, like, when we take communion, that it would mean something in that, like, you would have a renewed, refreshed hatred towards your sin. I hate it. Like, Christ died for this. I want to help kill it. I want to drag my sin into the light and curb stomp its face. But also, it's not your blood. It's not your body that's broke. It's Christ's blood. And it reminds us how amazing is his grace that he would take what we deserve. And I hope it would be this revived, refreshed appreciation of grace. And it would stoke up our worship that we have an awesome savior. And it would be the beginning of something special in you and something special in us. When we take our sin seriously and we take our God seriously and we say, God, you are better than anything this world has to offer. And I want you more. And I will weep and cry over my sin, and I will draw close to you, my savior. And if we get that church, I'm telling you, more than any kind of programming, any kind of funding, any kind of thing we could do as a church, it's nothing. Revival is about a group of people who are going to take their sin seriously. They're going to take their God seriously. And people that do that are going to experience mega grace enough that flows in us and overflows out from us. That's the church we want to be. Let's pray. Father, I pray something I can't do. I can yell, I can teach, I can't convict. That's a work of your spirit. And I pray that any of us in this room that are taking our sin lightly in the most loving way, would you chastise us? Would you wake us up to your holiness? Would we come to you in repentance? And can we run to you in repentance? Because we know that we would find mega Grace. So stoke our hearts for you. We come back to you in worship. We pray this in your name. Amen.