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23rd October 2024
WednesdayReflection
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'John Piper shares'
'founder and teacher of Desiring God.com'
"If the Lord Wills"
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Scripture: James 4:13-16
Warning against Boasting
"Now listen to me, you that say,
"Today or tomorrow we will travel to a certain city, where we will stay a year and go into business and make a lot of money."
You don't even know what your life tomorrow will be!
You are like a puff of smoke, which appears for a moment and then disappears
What you should say is this: "If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that."
But now you are proud, and you boast; all such boasting is wrong.
So then, if we do not do the good we know we should do, we are guilty of sin."
Let's walk through this text together, see the picture of God that is here, and how James says it should affect us.
James is reprimanding some folks here - perhaps businessmen or merchants - but it is stated very broadly so as to include virtually anyone. Anyone who does what?
What's the problem here? Is this wrong?
To plan and intend to go places and do things?
No, not per se.
In verse 15 he is going to say it is legitimate to plan to do this or that. What's wrong then, if it's not planning?
What's wrong is that the plan that is made in verse 13 is made in the mind and spoken with the mouth ("Come now you who say . . .") without taking a true view of life and God into account.
James says to those who are planning this business venture: "Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow.
You are just a puff of smoke that appears for a little while and then vanishes away."
In other words, in all your planning and in all your talk about your planning you are not taking this view of life into account.
I can imagine some American pragmatist saying,
"What practical difference would it make in my business planning whether I believe my life is a vapour?
Do I stop planning, because my life may be short or uncertain?"
I think James would say, "No, you don't stop planning.
You don't drop out of society. You don't become a hermit, waiting for your little vapor of life to disappear."
The point is that for James, and for God, it matters whether a true view of life informs and shapes the way you think and how you speak about your plans.
Your mindset matters.
How you talk about your plans matters. Ponder this.
It makes a difference how you think about it and talk about it.
Why? Why does that matter?
Because God created us not just to do things and go places with our bodies, but to have certain attitudes and convictions and verbal descriptions that reflect the truth - a true view of life and God.
God means for the truth about himself and about life to be known and felt and spoken as part of our reason for being.
You weren't just created to go to Denver and do business; you were made to go to Denver with thoughts and attitudes and words that reflect a right view of life and God.
That is, keep in mind that you have no firm substance on this earth.
You are as fragile as mist.
Keep in mind that you have no durability on this earth, for you appear "for a little while" - just a little while.
Your time is short.
And keep in mind that you will disappear. You will be gone, and life will go on without you.
It matters, he says, that you keep this view of life in mind.
"Instead, you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that."
In other words, it not only matters that you have a right view of life - but it also matters that you have a right view of God as you make your plans.
And that you give expression of this true view of God:
"You ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.'"
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This is an edited version.
The full article, and Bible references, is avaiable on request
Scroll down for the continuation of this discussion.
'John Piper'
is founder and teacher of Desiring God and chancellor of Bethlehem College and Seminary.
For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
He is author of more than 50 books, including Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist and most recently Foundations for Lifelong Learning: Education in Serious Joy.
More
He tells us two very important things about God.
One is contained in the words: "If the Lord wills, we will live."
And the other is contained in the words, "If the Lord wills, we will . . . do this or that."
How would you state the truth about God contained in each of those two sentences?
If the Lord Wills, We Will Live
First, when he says, "If the Lord wills, we will live," he teaches us that the duration of our lives is in the hands of God.
Or: God governs how long we will live.
Or: God is ultimately in control of life and death.
We may not know how long our vapour-like life will linger in the air, but God knows, because God decides how long we will live: "If the Lord wills we will live."
And James is saying:
If this is a true view of life and God, then it should shape our mindset and shape our way of talking.
In Acts 18:21, Paul left Ephesus and said, "I will return to you again if God wills."
In 1 Corinthians 4:19 he writes, "I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills."
For most of his life he did not know if the next town might be his burial place.
That was in the hands of God. And so are our lives.
God will decide how long we live and when we die.
And James' point is:
God means for that truth - that reality - to shape our mindset and our attitude and our words.
He means for that truth to be known and spoken about.
He means for it to be a part of the substance of our conversation.
God means for a true view of himself to be known and believed and embraced and cherished and kept in mind and spoken of.
"Instead you ought to say . . ."
If the Lord Wills, We Will Do This or That
Is there a deeper problem here than just the absence of true words and the presence of bad theology?
Yes, there is, and James describes it in verse 16:
"But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil."
The root problem is arrogance or pride, and the expression of that arrogance, he says, is "boasting."
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