True Religion: Persevering By Grace

James 1: 1 - 18

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SPEAKER_01 0:19

Would you now stand for the reading of God's Word? Our passage comes from the book of James. James chapter 1, beginning of verse 1. It is page 1075 in your Red Pew Bibles. If you didn't bring a Bible of your own, it should be a Red Pew Bible that looks like this. If you want to hunt one of those up and turn to page 1075, we'd like for everyone to be able to see the passage as it's being preached. James chapter 1, beginning of verse 1.

SPEAKER_04 0:51

James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes scattered among the nations, greetings. Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do. Believers in humble circumstances ought to take pride in their high position, but the rich should take pride in their humiliation, since they will pass away like a wildflower. For the sun rises with scorching heat and withers the plant, its blossoms fall and its beauty is destroyed. In the same way, the rich will fade even while they go about their business. Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial, because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life and the Lord has promised to those who love him. When tempted, no one should say, God is tempting me, for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone. But each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desires and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully grown, gives birth to death. Don't be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created. This is the word of the Lord.

SPEAKER_01 2:47

Thanks be to God. Thank you, Peyton. Great job. As we come to beginning a new series this summer, where we will be looking at the book of James. So let's pray as we come now to God's word. Father, we now come and humble ourselves before you, your presence, and your word. Lord, knowing that it is by your word that you have created all that we see. You spoke the world into existence. And Lord, we also learn that it is by your very word that we are recreated, new creation, new life, transformation. Lord, it all comes through the power of your word. So Lord, we come now to your word and we would ask that you would send your Spirit to take your word and to apply it to our hearts, Lord. Lord, that we may be set free, Lord, that we may see you accurately, and that, Lord, we may behold the glory of Jesus. In his name we pray. Amen. So a question to get us started this morning for our young people and really for all of us, because I think it can apply to us all. Have you ever started something in your life with great enthusiasm, with great hope, with great expectation, only to find that you didn't ever finish it? You ever had that experience in life? Does anybody remember your New Year's resolution this year? It's usually what happens to New Year's resolutions, right? And really, in so many areas of life that we can get so excited about something that we want to start, some new venture, some new commitment in our life, some new project that we're gonna get into. You know, I know as a parent, over the years, my kids have been like, you know, they get a wild hair that they're gonna build something. And I know, okay, I should participate in this, but what it's gonna result in is picking up the pieces of an unfinished project before too long. That's the nature of our hearts that we get so enthusiastic about the beginning. And so often we can start with these dreams and these visions and excitement, and oh, this is gonna be great, it's gonna be like this. But rarely do we really sit down at the very beginning and count the cost of what it will take to finish the thing, to persevere, because the reality is anything in life, especially if it's important and it's worthwhile, it's gonna come with difficulty. It's gonna come with hardship, it's gonna come with barriers and things that we're gonna encounter that require perseverance and endurance if you're gonna finish, if you're gonna make it to the end. You know, our our culture tends to really reinforce this challenge that we find in our own hearts to finish things well. Our culture is all about the immediate, it's all about instant gratification, it's all about the hype and the excitement of something that you're gonna do or something that you've you've just started. But very rarely is there much hype at all about finishing something or staying the course or making it all the way to the end. In our culture of hype, Eugene Peterson describes it in this way and how it impacts our faith, how it impacts finding ourselves in this culture and in Christianity where we tend to think about the enthusiasm of a start, or the enthusiasm about a beginning, but very little about finishing and endurance and perseverance. Here's what he says about our culture and about our Christian culture in particular. There is a great market for religious experience in our world. It is not difficult in such a world to get a person interested in the message of the gospel, but it is terribly difficult to sustain the interest. Well, it's a powerful statement. You know, especially as we find ourselves here in the Bible belt, where we see many making an impressive beginning, but we see very little attention to a sustained effort in what Eugene Peterson calls in his book a long obedience in the same direction. What a description of Christianity. A long obedience in the same direction. It's not often how we see it in our culture. So here's what we're gonna see in our passage this morning. We can joyfully persevere through the trials of this life as we trust in the sovereign grace of God in Christ. So, as I just mentioned, we're we're starting a new series that's gonna carry us throughout the summer in the book of James. And James was a very prominent leader in the early church. James was the half-brother of Jesus. That while Jesus in his earthly ministry, he did not believe or know Jesus, but was converted after Jesus' resurrection. James was one of the people that Jesus, that the resurrected Christ personally appeared to. And in the early church, James was a pillar. If you're familiar with the book of Acts, in Acts chapter 15, the first church council, it was James that was presiding over the council. He was one of the uh chief leaders in the early church. And the book of James is it's a very loved book because it's so straightforward, and he's not pulling any punches, and he's just giving it to you straight. And as we come to this uh book, what I'm calling it is, I'm calling this series as we're looking at James, um, true religion. Because one of the burdens of James is to help us really be clear about what is authentic, genuine faith. One of the things that James says over and over in the book is, do not be deceived, he says in our passage today, which would imply there is a great tendency to be deceived about what is real faith. What is this thing called Christianity? What does a life of following Jesus actually look like? Because it is so easy to be deceived about that, not just in James' day, but especially in ours, especially in the Bible Belt. So James is a very important book for us as we come here. Now, the passage that we come that we're beginning with here as he begins his book is really it's focusing on this idea of perseverance. The whole chapter. It's got a number of things that it's mentioning, but it's all tied into this idea of the importance of perseverance or endurance in the Christian life. Look at what he says in verse 12. Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial, because having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him. It's this summary for James where he's saying, listen, in the Christian life, perseverance is absolutely vital. Well, it's very important for us to hear that, especially in the Bible Belt, where everything is made of how you begin the Christian life. So much emphasis is put on someone praying a prayer or walking an aisle or having a religious experience in their life, but very little stress is put on endurance, making it to the end. Holding on to Jesus in faith all the way to the end of your life, because Scripture is very clear. Unless we persevere in faith, we will not be saved. Scripture is very clear about that. That's what James is saying here. If you persevere, if you cling to Jesus all the way to the end of your life, you will receive the crown of life, a common description of salvation. Now, apart from perseverance and endurance, we will get nothing. It's very crucial to understand in the Bible Belt because we can think I did this thing, so now I'm good. I prayed the prayer, I'm good. I believed in a moment, now I'm saved. Well, let's see. What do you do? Do you keep holding on to Jesus? Do you keep on believing to the very end? That is the ultimate evidence of salvation in the Christian life. So James here wants to emphasize how vital perseverance is. That the Christian life is all about just enduring, holding on to Jesus, walking through what he describes here as trials. You know, a trial is like a formal test or examination. You know what a test does? A test is given that I can see teachers smiling in the room. A test is administered to reveal something, right? It reveals what you know, right? You might be teaching all semester and you're thinking, hey, I think they're getting it. And then you give the test and they bomb it and you think, oh no, they're not nearly as far along as I thought. That's what a trial or a test does. It reveals what's on the inside. It's not about what you say, it's about what is revealed, especially in adversity in life. That's how our faith is tested. That's how you see what's really in there when you endure difficulty and hardship in the Christian life. Now, look, two things that he says here in the passage that I want us to see about perseverance. One is that what is needed for perseverance in the Christian life is a crucial perspective on adversity in our life. That's what we'll see first. A crucial perspective. And then, secondly, we'll see what we need for perseverance is gospel power. So, first, a crucial perspective. Look at what he says right off the bat in verse 2. He launches right in. You know, James doesn't spend a lot of time, you know, Paul's gonna spend a while just uh just soaking, drilling down deep and everything. James is just right to the point and he jumps right in. And here's the first thing he says in his letter, his epistle here. Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds. Now, let's just stop right there and say that's a very bizarre thing to say, is it not? Right? Either James is someone who enjoys pain, which he doesn't, no one does. Or this is a very confusing out of out of outer space perspective. What does he mean? Consider it pure joy when you face trials of many kinds. Now, those those trials in our life we know are painful. They hurt. Now, he says, many kinds is a way of saying this includes all kinds of stuff in the Christian life. It includes the big stuff, it includes the really painful events that we walk through in our life, but it also includes the small irritations of the everyday reality. It's all put into this category of the trials that God brings into your life. The scripture is very clear: if you want to follow Jesus, you will face afflictions. It is a promise. And so if someone is preaching or teaching, or if we have heard, you know, become a Christian and God will bless you, meaning that everything in your life is gonna go better and it's gonna be great, I hate to tell you, but that is a lie. And it's contradiction to Scripture. Scripture wants to be real clear. Listen, if you're gonna follow Jesus, it is gonna be painful because you're gonna have to follow him in and through the cross. That's just the nature of this life. The Apostle Paul says it is through many afflictions that we must enter the kingdom of God. There is no other way. But what James wants us to see is a certain perspective on the trials in our life. Now, he's not saying, you know, consider it pure joy in the sense of like pain is good. You need to go seek hard things in your life, you know. Or what how this often gets portrayed, I think particularly in the Bible Belt, is that we just deny what hurts in our life. In other words, we just put a smile on it. You know, the the idea being that Christianity is all about being positive, just being happy, no matter what happens. How you doing, better than I deserve, right? But we're not being honest because our hearts broke and we're we're walking through incredible pain and challenge in our life, and we got doubts and we got questions, but then we come together and we say, let's put that smile on, all is good. That's not what he's saying here. He's saying that we can be joyful in the midst of our afflictions if we have a particular perspective on them. What is that perspective? That's the because in verse 3. Look at verse 3. It begins with because. That is a reason clause here. The reason that we can have joy in all the afflictions in our life is because of this. Because you know something. You know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. And let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. See, the thing that gives us a perspective of joy, even in the midst of pain in our life, is knowing that it has purpose. Our affliction has purpose in our life. That God has sovereignly brought this into my life. That is the teaching of Scripture. That is not true. All things are ultimately from God's hand. He is sovereign. That is cover to cover in the book of James. Right? The troubles that we find in our life, the circumstances, the hardships, the challenges are not some accident. They have been brought through the loving, good hand of our Father. They have a purpose. God brings affliction into our life because only through affliction do we grow in perseverance. And you see, perseverance has got an ultimate goal in and of itself. It's that we become mature in the faith, that we grow, that we become like Jesus. You cannot grow, you cannot change, you cannot deepen in your relationship with Jesus apart from trouble and adversity. It just won't happen. I bet we could go through the room and talk about times in our life, seasons in our life where we experience the most growth. And I would bet 99.9% of the time it was in the midst of pain and challenge and adversity in our life. That's how it works. You cannot persevere unless you're walking through something that you have to persevere in. That's how it works. And so it is in adversity, it's in pain that we grow, that what's on the inside gets revealed. You know, sometimes we can feel so spiritual and so mature in our faith and so, you know, grown up as a Christian, and then bring adversity into my life, and what do I immediately see? I'm not nearly as spiritual as I thought I was. I'm not as strong as I thought I was. I'm not as committed as I thought I was, I'm not as devoted as I thought I was. I'm weak. But you see, that's a beautiful moment because it's the opportunity to grow. That's where perseverance happens, that's where transformation happens. And so James says, you know, once you see this, it changes your perspective. So that whenever that thing comes into your life, you see, wait a minute, I don't like this, I don't want this in my life. And adversity often, I think most of the time falls into two categories. It's something in your life you do not want because it is painful, or it's something that is not in your life that you deeply and desperately want. Both of those include the adversities that God brings into our life, right? And so, in the face of that, it reveals what's in our heart and gives us an opportunity to go to God. It is in the midst of adversity that our hearts are weaned off of the world. It's in the midst of adversity that we grow in prayer. You know, is your prayer life shallow and flat and infrequent? Things might be going well in your life then. When does our prayer life grow and deepen and develop? Only when we come to a point of being like, I cannot handle life on my own. And my life is falling apart. And God, I must have you to show up in my life. If you get to that place, you're probably about to start praying. Adversity, troubles, trials they have the opportunity to drive us to God, to humble our hearts, to expose what Cody was talking about earlier, our weakness, our need. Our need is the way we get to Jesus. It's what draws us to Him. So it's crucial to have this perspective on our trials and our troubles and our adversities. And then James, throughout the passage, he'll go through and he'll talk about all kinds of things pertaining to perseverance, important things with perseverance, wisdom, all these different things. But then in verse 13, he mentions temptation. Now it's very interesting here. Temptation is different from a trial. A temptation and a trial, they're two different things. Oftentimes we can get them confused. A test is not a temptation, but very often a temptation will arise in the midst of a test. It's often when we're going through something hard in life that we're most susceptible to temptation in our life. But God does bring tests and adversity into our life. He does not bring temptation. Temptation is not from God. But where is it from? James wants us to be very clear about this: that temptation, though it does come outside of us, is primarily inside of us. Now this is important to see. Very often when we think of temptation, we think of the external. We think of the temptations of the world, or we think of the temptations of Satan in our life, both very real. But what we usually really underestimate is the temptation of our sinful nature. And that's what he wants to really highlight right here. You know, I think often as Christians, we can be far more concerned and worried and fearful of the world out there than we are of the sin in here. James doesn't want us to fall into that trap. You know, I think as Christian parents, so sometimes so often we can put all of our energy into protecting our children from the world. Don't get me wrong, that's important. It is a calling for us as parents. But we put all of our energy in, let me make sure there's no exposure to the dangerous, scary world out there. But what James wants us to understand as parents, or even for ourselves, is that what's far more dangerous for us is what's in here. It's our sinful nature. Look at what he says, verse 14. Each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. You get that metaphor? James loves to use these really powerful metaphors. The metaphor is of a wild beast that's hunting you. Actually, we get that same image in Genesis. This might be a reference to that, where God says to Cain, Sin is crouching at your door. And that's kind of the image that he's using here is that the temptation from within, the sin within, wants to sink its teeth into us and then drag us away. That's his description of our hearts and our own evil desires. So he talks about all these things and perseverance that we need to know, the dangers of temptation that will come in the Christian life, the missing of perspective and the troubles of our life, so many different things. But here's the main thing to see. If you've been asleep, wake up and pay attention to this right here. Where does he ultimately end up? What does he want to show us is the ultimate power in the face of perseverance and challenge and trial in the Christian life? It's ultimately this. Now, when when somebody says don't be deceived, we should probably assume it's really easy to get the wrong idea in this area. It's really easy to be deceived about something. What is it that James is concerned that we will be deceived about? His concern in this place is that we will be deceived about the heart of the Father in the midst of our adversity. That's the great danger. Is that when you are walking through something painful in your life, that you will interpret that circumstance, that pain, that difficulty, whatever it may be, that you will interpret it to be God's lack of love for you. That's the great temptation. And if you've walked through through through adversity, and I know that we all had, it's like visceral. This sense that God is distant from you when you're walking through pain. I mean, it's like automatic. Like, God, where are you? Where I don't feel you. You feel far away, you feel like you've forgotten me. That's what pain, that's what hard things in our life, that's what it feels like in the bones. And so the easiest thing is to be deceived in that place and to interpret God's heart and his goodness by our circumstances, rather than interpreting our circumstances by what we know of God's heart. That's what he's talking about here. Do not be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Verse 17. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He wants us to know God's heart. Don't be deceived. Remember who God is. Cling to the truth of his word, like he is your father. Every good and perfect gift in your life, every good blessing in your life is from him. Not begrudgingly, he's got to give you something, but because it is the overflow of his heart, God is overwhelmingly generous. He loves to give good gifts to us. And every good gift in our life is from him because it's who he is. And as he says here, he doesn't change like shifting shadows. You know, the problem is we change all the time. That's the problem with perseverance. I get pumped up about Jesus, and then tomorrow I've forgotten him altogether. Right? That's us, that's the nature of our hearts. But here's some good news: God isn't like that. He doesn't change. God doesn't like when we're getting it right, like he's really for us and loves us, and then whenever we're struggling and blowing it big, he's like, My heart's changed towards you. My affections are changed towards you. That's not what God's like. We often believe that's what God's like, but James is saying, don't be deceived. He doesn't change like us. He doesn't, I love you now, I don't tomorrow. His love doesn't change. And then ultimately in verse 18, he brings us back to God's sovereign grace for us in Jesus. Look what he says here. He chose, this is the ultimate gift. He who's he, it's God, it's the Father, he chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created. Now, he's not talking about our natural birth here. He's not talking about he chose to give us life and that we were born into this world. That is a wonderful gift. But he's talking about a far more wonderful gift here. It is new birth and new life in Jesus. He takes us back to our salvation, he takes us back to the grace of God in our salvation. Look at how he describes our salvation here. He chose to give us birth through the word. That that's James's description of salvation. It's all about God's grace towards us. That's that's the ultimate picture of God's grace is the fact that our salvation, that what initially brought us to Jesus was not us, it was Him. He chose us. God's sovereign grace in salvation. You see, nothing more highlights God's grace than the fact that He is the one who chose us. We chose Him. If you're in Christ, you chose Him, you made a decision for Christ, you submitted your life to Him. All that's true. But the Bible wants us to know that you only did that because He first chose you. You see, when you see that, first it's offensive to our pride. It's offensive. Who are you telling me I didn't do this? You know, I believed. I did something there. Well, yeah, you did, but only because He opened your eyes. Only because through the gospel word, He gave you new life, He opened your eyes. God said into the darkness of your heart, let there be light. That's what happened in your salvation. That's Paul's description in 2 Corinthians. Our salvation is all of God's sovereign choice of us, and not because of anything in us. God didn't look at us and say, you know what? I'd really like to have this one on my team. I see a lot of potential in him. I think he'll make a great Christian. In fact, usually it's the opposite. Usually he's like, Well, this is the worst and the most broken. I think I'm picking that one, right? Is apart from any goodness in us, any merit in us, any inclination towards him. In fact, it's usually the opposite, and God gave us life. Why? Grace alone. When you see that, it is the power of perseverance in the Christian life. It is the sovereign grace of God to know, God, I didn't get into this thing on my own, and I can't get out of this thing on my own. That is a great peace. Paul says in 1 Philippians 6, He who began a good work in you. Who began this work? Not me, he did. He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion in the day of Jesus Christ. God didn't start this thing and he's gonna bail it. When God starts something, he finishes it. See, the ultimate assurance of perseverance is that he will persevere us. He who began this work, he's gonna complete it. Amen. So it's as we know the sovereign grace of God in Jesus, as we know his heart of grace towards us, that is the power of perseverance. That is Jesus said, no one can snatch you out of my hand. So here's the question as we bring this home and apply it to our lives. What trials are you facing in your life right now? What adversity? What pain? What challenges? What things are you facing? Because I know we are. And for some of us, they're really big and really painful and feel really consequential, and we don't know how they're gonna go. We don't know what's gonna be the fallout of this thing in our life, and for others of us, it's just the the everyday irritation and challenge of living in a broken world, right? What challenges are you facing in your life? You know, it's funny, this past week, I had a challenging week. Not because it was any huge thing in my life, but it was like this accumulation of feeling disconnected and blocked from what I kept needing and and trying to seek out all week. You know, I felt like it was one of those weeks where there was just too much in my life already. And then all this stuff is happening and coming into my life that's just feeling it more and more. If you ever just felt so full and distracted and pulled in so many directions that you're just like, I don't even know what to do. I felt that a lot this week. And and every time I had this like this plan or this hope, okay, this day's gonna be different. Something else would come and just blow that day up too. Now, I'm not talking about huge stuff, you understand? That's part of the point. Like it wasn't huge stuff, but I can tell you what was coming out of my heart was some foul stuff. Like I wouldn't, I was I was irritable. I was irritable. I was lashing out at people in certain ways, right? And then on Friday, finally I had this day where I was like, okay, I got this day. I got nothing scheduled. I'm gonna be with God, connect with God. I'm so in need of that. I I've got time to sit with his word because I felt like all that was getting blown up all week. And then and then circumstances happened, and I kept getting blocked, and my irritation level was going up during the day, and things weren't working out, right? And I was irritated, and and and I actually was not loving and kind to a brother in our body here. And I had to apologize. But you know what I ultimately saw? I'm sitting here studying this passage, and I'm like, oh my gosh, are you kidding me? God, you got me living this. I'm I'm living the passage this week. So this is what you're talking about. Now realize all week I wasn't connecting it, right? Because this is about spiritual stuff, right? And the irritations in my life. Well, that's something separate. It's not how God sees it. It's not how God sees it. You know, it took me all week to get to the point of saying, oh, so this is what you're talking about, huh? Consider it pure joy when my weed gets blown up. Consider it pure joy when things are going wrong in my life, even if they're small, right? Have this perspective on it that wait, you you grow in me because your ultimate goal in my life is not my comfort, which is often my main goal. Your goal in my life is maturity, perseverance, virtue. You want to make me a certain kind of person, a person who's kind when I'm in the midst of the adversity, which is not natural to me, right? And it doesn't go my way. See, the ultimate choice is what will I believe in the middle of it? That same thing is true for you in your adversity. What will you believe? And what have you walking through? What perspective will you choose to take? And you gotta choose to take it. Because the natural perspective is I'm just gonna sit, I'm gonna be irritable, I'm gonna be pessimistic, I'm gonna be, you know, fill in the blank, right? You gotta choose to say, am I gonna believe something here about what God has said? What perspective am I gonna take on it? Am I gonna am I gonna believe God is in control of even this, that he's brought this into my life because he wants to do something in me? Well, I believe that. That's our choice as we come and walk through these things in our life. Do you believe there's purpose in my pain? And the purpose is from my Father who loves me more than I could ever fathom. Do I believe he's committed to me? Do I believe I'm his? Do I believe that even my perseverance is in his hands? It ultimately all boils down to this. What will you believe in the midst of the adversity, of the trials? So let's stop there, and we got a few moments to discuss it. What's happening in you as you hear James's message to us, this call to perseverance, how we do it, the centrality of the gospel in it, what's happening in you? How are you challenged? How are you stirred? It's part of how we apply God's word as we work it out a little bit together at the end.

SPEAKER_02 40:10

I just want to say really briefly that a lot of times I get to a lot of trouble, trials, and things like this. And I think I understand God's plan for so long. Like I think I know what God's up to, or I don't know. I think that I've experienced a lot of growth is when I'm in the middle of it, like you did this week, um, of saying, like, okay, Lord, what are you up to? Because often we think he's up to this path of sanctification, but he's actually up to something completely different. Because a lot of times what we think of sanctification is like piety.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 40:44

And he's actually up to making us more loving and more kind and more like aware of him, more humble, more gentle. And so I just think, I just think that when I talk to people, even it seems like when our lives are falling apart, we can think we know what God's up to, or whatever, you know. It's just, I think that there's a lot of growth that can come when we're like, Lord, like, what are you up to? What do you want me to see? Like just a real humble posture to the Lord of like, okay, you've got my attention. Maybe my way is not your way. Maybe you have something different. So, anyway.

SPEAKER_01 41:18

That's huge. Yeah, humility, and and James will talk about humility in in a future chapter, the centrality of it. Humility is the secret to change. Humility is almost another word for repentance. They are near synonyms, right? Humility is the beginning of change, right? And so it's just if you don't know what to do, just humble yourself before God. Probably some good stuff's gonna happen.

SPEAKER_00 41:50

It's a great word. Um, I just had a quick word. Um I had in my head this week that um whoever loses his life will gain it. There that that word of just if you find your life, you lose it. If you lose your life, you gain life. Yeah, I think I was just encouraged that the joy there is in that in that scripture, it's like when you lose your life, when your life blows up, yeah, there is life in that.

SPEAKER_01 42:17

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 42:17

You know, and it's it is pure joy. Yes. I thought that was a really good kind of yes. I had that comparison in my head.

SPEAKER_01 42:23

Yeah. It's often in that place that you realize that Jesus is enough, and that's where you get the joy.

SPEAKER_03 42:33

Um, I I I had to learn, just like you just said, I thought I had to be tough, you know, get through it, don't show it, you know, be stoic, kind of. I find that's the worst way. Yes. That's where pride takes over. And I learned best just to truly say, okay, I messed up. I don't have to be perfect. And I'll get through this if I let God take control. Yeah. So I just say pride is a big enemy.

SPEAKER_01 43:05

Yes. Yeah. Thank you, Chris. That's from a saint who's walked this out for a long time. You know, I think as we have this, as we see the Bible's value and perseverance, it makes the older saints in our room, we have a few here, it makes their their value to us go up. Because we say, oh, wait a minute. They've walked this for a long time. I think I need to listen. So thank you for speaking up. And please continue. Those of us who've walked with Jesus for a substantial amount of time, we need your voice. Because we're so wrapped up in the moment of this world of like what's happening now. Thank you.

SPEAKER_05 43:54

Hi, Hutch. Um, I found the timing of this sermon very funny because last Sunday was having a really, really hard day. I was very overwhelmed. You know, I'm working, I'm doing school, I'm doing a lot of things at once. And I just kind of broke down. And I was talking to Corey, and he was like, you know, life is really, really hard sometimes, and we just don't know why. And I looked at him and I was like, but there's kind of a beauty in going through hard times, like the fact that we can go through hard things and we can get through them. And so the timing of this was funny because I literally said that to him last Sunday. And so I think God knew I needed this sermon. Yeah. And that was really good. But yeah, because it's like, yeah, I'm going through a lot because I'm having to maintain all of these different things in my life, but like I am able to go to college. I am able to work, and I am able, and I receive all of these blessings. So, yes, it's overwhelming, but it's because there are so many blessings that it's hard to keep track of them.

SPEAKER_01 45:07

Yeah, yeah. Thank you for sharing that. Father in heaven, we we all come and bow before you right here, and Lord, we we are clinging to the truth of your word. Lord, there are seasons in our life where the darkness is so great, Lord, we feel utterly alone. And the the psalmist shows us that. Lord, would you glorify your name through a great deliverance here? Lord, we know your heart. You have revealed your heart. We know that you are a loving Father. We know that nothing can snatch us out of your hands. Lord, we cling to those promises. Lord, we just pray for your rescue. We pray for your protection. We pray for your truth to break through all the lies, all the fears, all the darkness. Lord, would you come near? Would you bring healing? Would you bring relief? Lord, you say weeping may remain for a night, but joy comes in the morning. Lord, we know that we are not saved through anything in us, and we know that we are not persevered through anything in us. We're not delivered from anything in us. And so we acknowledge and claim that that you, a Lord, you alone can deliver her heart and rescue her from this darkness. We plead and pray that you would do that now. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.