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Fruitful Faith - James
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We all make plans. I remember being 18 years old, a sophomore in college, working at a bank as a teller while taking evening classes. I had dreams—big dreams. I had a 25-year plan mapped out: work my way up the bank, complete my degree, study economics and finance in graduate school, run for Congress, then the Senate, and by my early 40s, be elected president of my country. I could see it so clearly. I had a mental picture of it all.
As you can imagine, it didn't work.
I was appointed to go to Washington, D.C. as a diplomat, but then the Lord saved me. He rescued me when I wasn't even looking for Him. My plan shifted slightly—not much—but now I wondered: how can I accomplish this plan as a Christian? When I met my future wife, I was a young, immature Christian, and she was more spiritually mature. On our first date, I told her, "I know you want to go to law school and become president of the Supreme Court, but what if you give up that plan and become the first lady instead?" [laughter] What was I thinking? Thankfully, it worked out—we're married now—but I tell you, none of the plans I put together have worked.
One day, the Lord convicted me deeply. I said, "Lord, I don't know where You're leading me or what I'm supposed to do. I just want to be faithful and serve You." And it was so freeing. I wasn't trying to orchestrate and control everything anymore. I was just trusting the Lord.
I realized I was prideful and arrogant. I thought I could presume on the future, that I could know and control it. But God was never part of the equation. It was my plan, my ideas—and I never asked God. I never consulted the Lord.
James addresses this very heart, this very spirit. He says it is pride, and it is sin.
If God is absent from your plans, you are living as if He is absent from your life.
Planning your future without God is not just foolish. It is practical and functional atheism. It's idolatry. Planning without God is pride. But living with God is freedom.
Before we unpack this passage, I want to explain how the Bible speaks about the will of God. The Scripture uses two concepts:
The Decreed Will of God — This is God's sovereign plan that will certainly come to pass. Nothing can stop it. For example, Isaiah 53 speaks of Jesus's coming 700 years before it happened. The cross was not Plan B; it was God's decreed will. When Jesus faced the cross, He said, "Not My will, but Your will." That decreed will of God—no one could stop it. Satan could not stop it. The cross happened exactly as God had ordained.
The Moral Will of God — This is God's revealed standard for how we should live. For example, 1 Thessalonians 4:3 says, "This is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality." God's will is that you be holy. But some people do this, and some don't. God won't force holiness on you. Similarly, 1 Thessalonians 5:18 says, "Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."
God will never have a will for you that is inconsistent with His Word. With what we don't know, we trust Him. With what we do know, we obey Him.
Let's read James 4:13-14: "Come now, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit.' Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes."
James is not addressing pagans here. He's addressing professing believers—the church. He's saying: you who claim to follow Jesus, but you live as if Jesus does not exist. You're functioning as a pagan, as a functional atheist.
Notice the language of these merchants: "We will go. We will trade. We will make a profit." They think they control the future. They presume to be in control of:
But the missing piece in all of this is God. God is not present in their speech or their thinking.
We've been trained by society, by industry, by the world to think we control things when we cannot. We make a five-point business plan—when, where, how long, what, and why—and then we "sprinkle some Bible verses on top" to make it Christian. But at its core, it's not Christian. It's carnal. It's fleshly. We don't ask God; we just pray, "God, please bless this plan I've already made."
Verse 14 asks a piercing question: "What is your life?" And the answer: "You are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes."
That word—mist—is used only once in the New Testament. It's visible, but you cannot control it. You cannot hold it in your hands. It appears, and then it's gone. Our lives are short, fragile, and without our control. The Bible never tells us to count the years of our life or the decades. It tells us to think about the days. It's short.
And when you presume upon tomorrow—when you boast in your own ability to control the future—verse 16 tells us: "You boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil."
When you do this, you're assuming you are God. Only God is God. The word "arrogance" that James uses here appears only twice in the New Testament—here and in 1 John 2:16, which describes "the pride of life." What is pride? It's saying, This is my life, and I will do whatever I want with it. I will do it my way. But my way is the song people sing on the way to hell. We don't do it our way; we do it God's way—Jesus's way.
Verse 15 shows the contrast. Instead of "I will," here's what you ought to say: "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that."
This is the heart of obedience. This is trusting God's sovereignty. You are not sovereign; God is. This is divine sovereignty.
Historically, Christians understood this. If you find letters from Christians in the 1700s, you'll see two initials at the end: D.V. — Deo volente, meaning "God willing." Why? Because they knew they didn't control the future. Whatever they planned to do, it was Deo volente—God willing.
Even the Apostle Paul lived this way. Writing to the Romans, whom he'd never met, Paul wanted to come visit them and use the church as a hub for missions to Spain. But look at how he expressed it:
Romans 1:10 — "Always praying for you, asking that somehow by God's will I may now at last succeed in coming to you."
And again:
Romans 15:32 — "Then, by the will of God, I will be able to come to you with joyful heart."
Paul had a strategy, a plan—but he held it loosely, submitted to God's will. That is so freeing and liberating.
We agonize over the future. Instead, we should say: "Lord, I'm trusting You. I know I'll be doing what You want me to do, not what my boss wants or what this person wants. I trust You."
Our job is to be faithful with what we know and faithful in the present, not to agonize over the future.
I once spoke with a young man in his early 20s who was anxious about his girlfriend possibly breaking up with him. He was building plans, worrying about the whole future. I said, "Friend, you don't even know if God has this person for you for the rest of your life. If she is, you will be together. Trust Him. Be faithful and do what is right." Many of you have dated someone you thought would be your life partner. It didn't work out. Now you're married to someone else, and you're grateful and happy. That's how God works.
God knows better than you what you need. Sometimes we think we need something, we get it, and then we regret it. So we trust Him.
We plan, yes—but we go to God, we ask Him, we pray, we seek His will, and we trust Him. This attitude produces freedom. The person who holds plans loosely is more at peace, even more productive, and joyful.
James is not calling you to figure out God's hidden plan for your life. He's calling you to submit to the will He has already revealed.
Verse 17: "So, whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin."
This is the sin of omission—knowing what to do but not doing it.
In context, these merchants knew they should say, "If the Lord wills." It was part of their church language. But they chose to ignore God's will. And that's a good definition of sin: knowing better and not doing it.
This has deep implications for the Christian life and the church. I would say much of the sin in our lives, in our congregation, in our churches is not ignorance. It's the gap between what we know and how we live.
The problem is not that we don't know enough. The problem is that we know this, but we live like this. The problem is not lack of knowledge; it's lack of obedience. Satan's strategy is to keep us presuming on tomorrow so that we live without dependence on God, without a sense of urgency, without submission.
Submission must become obedience. The issue is not information; it's obedience. Do what you know.
So the question James asks is: "What is your life?"
Yes, your life is brief. But it's held in the hands of a sovereign and good God. Your life is short, but it's not meaningless. Your life has meaning, has a purpose in Christ, has dignity, has value. It's short, but it's powerful.
James is inviting us to trust the Lord—not because we control the future, but because we belong to the One who owns and controls the future.
The reality is, brothers and sisters, we have all failed to trust the Lord. I made plans without asking Him. I didn't seek Him. I had my own ideas. That demonstrated my pride, my sin of self-sufficiency, my arrogance.
The invitation for us is to repent of that sin.
But there's One—only One—who lived perfectly: the Lord Jesus Christ. Only He ever perfectly said, "Not My will, but Your will." When He faced the cross, facing the wrath of God and judgment for us, in His humanity He said, "Not My will, but Your will."
Jesus not only saved us through His life, death, and resurrection—He also showed us a life of dependence on God. He fully trusted His Father.
The Bible teaches that we have all sinned against God, and our sins separate us from Him. Because God is just, holy, and perfect, He cannot leave the guilty unpunished. But in His great mercy and love, He sent His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who:
God raised Him, vindicating His work and declaring victory over sin and death.
For anyone who turns away from their sins and trusts in Jesus, there is salvation. The Bible says, "Whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved." If you trust Jesus, believe in Jesus, and put your faith in Him, the Lord will redeem you, secure you, keep you, and bless you.
Only then—when you turn away from self-sufficiency and trust in Jesus—will you be able to truly say, "If the Lord wills." It won't just be words you say; it will be the way you live.
And that will be the safest place to be—not necessarily the most comfortable, but the safest and the joyful place: in God's will.
Brothers and sisters, let us trust the Lord. Let us reject this spirit of self-sufficiency. Let us live in submission to His will and His sovereign power, trusting the Lord. He knows better.
For those of you who have not yet trusted Christ, Jesus is calling on you today. Turn away from your sins and believe in His name. Put your faith in Him. Find freedom in Him. Find hope in Jesus. Find life in Christ. Amen.
