There are two truths the Bible makes unmistakably clear. The first is that believers will go through great suffering and various trials. When the Lord called Saul of Tarsus to himself, changing his name to Paul and making him the apostle to the Gentiles, he told Ananias, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name” (Acts 9:15-16). In fact, when Paul wrapped up the book of Galatians, he wrote, “From now on let no one cause me trouble, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus” (Gal 6:17). That is to say, “If you want to know if I belong to Christ, look at the marks I bear on my body. I have suffered for his name’s sake.” That is what Paul is saying.
But Paul is not unique. Rather, he tells Timothy, “All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tim 3:12) and then reminds the believers on his missionary journey that it is “through many tribulations that we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). Thus, one truth the Bible makes unmistakably clear to us is that we will walk through suffering (perhaps intense suffering) and various trials in this life.
Yet there is a second truth that the Bible makes unmistakably clear to us. It is that the God who created all things and is the sovereign Lord over the universe loves us. He loves his children. In fact, when we consider how much we love our own children, Jesus reminds us that we are evil so that we will realize how much God loves us (Matt 7:9-11). That is, if I am evil and love my children and want only good for my children, then how much more does God love me and how much more is he committed to my good! In fact, he demonstrated his love for us by sending his Son to die for us when we were his enemies (Rom 5:8). The Bible makes the truth that God loves his children unmistakably clear.
So, how is it that we bring these two things together? On the one hand, the certainty of suffering (even intense suffering) and various trials, and on the other hand the certainty that the God who reigns over the world loves us. It seems that they’re in conflict, doesn’t it? So, how do we hold these two truths together? Various answers have been given. Some have suggested that the way that we bring together our suffering and God’s love for us is by considering that he is somehow not sovereign in our suffering. That is, if you can remove God from being in control of the world, then all of the sudden the mystery is solved. This answer makes God somewhat like us. That is, you can suffer while knowing deeply that I love you, and it doesn’t cause you some philosophical problems because you simply say, “Lee has no power over my trouble.” So, some would suggest that we think that way toward God. In our suffering, we just remind ourselves that he loves us and has nothing to do with our suffering and is basically powerless to prevent it or stop it when it starts.
But this simply will not work because God is not like us, and there is not one thing in the world that happens outside of the realm of his sovereign reign. Others, therefore, have tried to bring these two truths of suffering and God’s love together by suggesting that all trials simply show our lack of faith. That is, they recognize that there is suffering in the world, and they recognize that God loves us. So, they suggest that God indeed wants us never to suffer. He wants us to be healthy and wealthy at all times. He wants to demonstrate to the world that we are children of the king. Therefore, if we suffer (and we do), it has nothing to do with God but simply shows that we fail to believe. We don’t have enough faith for him to reward us with perfect health and wealth and a suffer-free life.
But this will not do, either, for we have clearly shown that it was God’s will that Paul suffer much in his life, and when suffering came to Job, it is Job’s righteousness that is highlighted at the beginning of the book. God does not appear to Job at the end of the book saying, “The problem is that you didn’t have enough faith. Otherwise, you would have been healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
So, if these are wrong answers, what is the right one? How do we hold together these unmistakably clear truths that we will suffer and go through various trials in this life and that God loves us more deeply than anyone we could imagine? I think James provides for us helpful guidance here as we look at James 1:1-11. He provides for us in these verses a perspective on trials that clearly acknowledges trials as real while also holding to the deep love of our sovereign God. And he writes this as one who is “a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ,” as he reminds us in 1:1. Therefore, as we read the book of James, we are reminded again that the though the Bible is written by diverse men over thousands of years, it is God’s Word to us. So, how is it then that James tells us to consider these two realities together? He tells us that we can know joy by considering God’s work in the midst of our trials.
So, James does not see suffering as some oddity that shouldn’t happen to the Christian. Nor does he try to remove God as far as possible from our suffering. Rather, he tells us that we can find joy in the midst of our suffering by considering what God is doing in and through our trials.
We see first of all this exhortation to joy and admission that trials will come in verse 2. He writes, “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds.” So, first, James just acknowledges, trials will come. In the words of Peter, “Do not be surprised” when a trial comes to you “as through something strange were happening to you” (1 Pet 4:12). Trials are not strange. They’re the norm in life. Trials are consistent in life.
But James also tells us that we can find joy in it. Indeed, he commands us to consider it joy. But before I tell you why, let me stop you from reading this text wrongly. By “all joy” James isn’t commanding us, “Have no sorrow but only joy when trials come.” That’s not what he’s saying. By “all joy” I think he means something like “genuine joy.” That is, just as he’s not saying, “Have no sorrow,” nor is he saying, “Slap a fake smile on your face so that people will think you’re a Christian.” Fake smiles or denying our sorrow in the midst of great trials is not Christianity. Rather, he’s saying, there is a cause for genuine, true joy – not fake smiles but true joy.
Well, how, then, do we know that joy? How do we count it all joy in the midst of great trials? He tells us that the basis for our joy is something we know, something we can remind ourselves of, and meditate on. He says in verses 3, “For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.”
With this, James peels back the veil a bit to show us a glimpse of what God is doing in the midst of our suffering. Now, I don’t think that James’ intent is to give us the whole answer. But he’s giving us a slice of the answer, and it’s a slice that is present and true in every single trial we face. One thing that God is doing when we have trials is that he’s refining our faith, making it stronger, so that it might produce perseverance.
Now, let me show you how I perceive this to work. If anyone is going to appear before Christ on that final day and hear, “Enter into my rest,” then they will be someone who persevered in holding to the gospel by faith in this life. We see this reality again and again in the Scripture. Three examples will suffice in what I call the “if” verses. You’ll see why when I read them.
1 Corinthians 15:1-2 – “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you – unless you believed in vain.”
Colossians 1:21-23 – “And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.”
Hebrews 3:14 – “For we share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.”
Now, we see in each of these verses that only those who persevere in the faith will have eternal life. Yet, we also know from other parts of the Bible that God preserves his children. Paul tells the Philippians, “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil 1:6). Therefore, we can conclude that God’s children must persevere in faith, but if anyone really is God’s child, God will make absolutely sure that child will persevere to the end.
But then, a logical question is, “How?” How will God work to make sure that his children persevere in the faith? How will God show his faithfulness to us in this life to complete what he started in us and not let us go? What will he do to ensure we hold fast until the end to our faith in Christ?
James says to us in verses 2-3, “I’ve got one part of that answer for you; he works through trials to refine and strengthen our faith so that it might grow into persevering faith.” Therefore, one thing (perhaps among many) that God is doing through our trials is that he’s strengthening your faith so that you will hold fast in faith firm until the end. When trials come into our lives, one thing we can know is that God is saying, “I will not let you go. I will make sure you persevere.”
Then, James adds in verse 4, “And let steadfastness [i.e., that perseverance] have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” That is, as trials come, let them drive you to the Lord. Cling more tightly to him. Find your dependence on him to be greater. And let your faith grow in perseverance because ultimately, God is going to bring you to that day when you will be complete, mature in Christ.
You see, perseverance isn’t the final goal of trials. The final goal of our trials will only be known on that day when we are glorified. But let trials and perseverance in those trials keep pushing you to hold more tightly to Christ. And as you recognize that God is using your trials to ensure your final salvation, conforming you to the image of Christ, strengthening your faith so that you persevere to the end – rejoice, find genuine joy, because the God who loves you is working all things to the end of conforming you to the image of his Son.
Perhaps, however, you hear this and say, “Okay, I believe this is indeed being used by God for my perseverance in the faith, and I’m eager to let perseverance have its full effect, but I find myself in the midst of this trial having no idea what I need to do next. I don’t know what would be wise or good or helpful or God-honoring.”1 If this describes what you may be thinking or saying to yourself, then the good news is that the Lord anticipates our lack of wisdom in the present. The better news is that he commands us to ask him for wisdom, and he will give it.
Playing off on the word “lacking” in verse 4, James writes in verse 5, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.” See, God knows that we don’t have the wisdom we need, so he tells us to ask him for it. And he wants us to know that he gives generously. In fact, generously is probably too weak a translation for the idea here. The idea behind the word translated “generously” is better understood something like “with single, undivided intention.”2 That is, God is not one who hears your request for wisdom and says, “Sure, I’ll give it, but I’ve got more important things to be concerned with.” Rather, a request for wisdom is a request for something that God delights in giving, something right in line with God’s will for us so that we might walk pleasing before him.
Moreover, God does not hold our lack of wisdom against us. This is what James means when he says that he gives to all “without reproach.” God is not saying, “I can’t believe you don’t have enough wisdom.” Rather, he says, “Yes, my child, ask me. This is exactly what I want to give you.”
For some reason we are tempted to think that God is annoyed at our requests of him. Perhaps it is because we’ve bought into the thought that we’re being selfish if we ask God for something. Maybe we think of God like someone working diligently and not wanting to be disturbed. But a better idea according to this text is that we’re asking something of one who is waiting and ready to pounce with the provision we need. After all, who wants you to walk in a pleasing way before God more – you or God? Of course, the answer is God. So, why would we think he wants to withhold wisdom from us?
However, James gives us a qualification for asking God. He writes in 6-8, “But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”
Now, this obviously catches our attention, doesn’t it? If there’s a kind of man who will not receive anything from the Lord, then we don’t want to be that kind of man. So, what kind of man is James talking about here?
James is not talking about a kind of person who has some doubting in his mind when he prays. Perhaps none of us can believe fully all the time in this life. Rather, what James is warning against is the kind of man who is not sure that he is committed to walking in the wisdom that God provides. That is, you have to ask God while being fully committed to walking in line with the wisdom he provides. You can’t ask God for wisdom while being unsure whether you want to obey him or walk in the ways of the world’s wisdom.
God doesn’t dispense of his wisdom to those who are not sure they want to obey him. So, you can’t come to God unsure whether you want to obey. Because he gives single, undivided attention in answering the requests of his children for wisdom, he demands that they come to him with a single, undivided intention of obeying him.
So, God not only wants us to know of his work in our trials so that we might know joy in them, he also wants us to know that he delights in giving us wisdom for knowing how to walk in and through our trials, as long as we’re committed to obeying him.
Finally, James gives us an example of how two believers must focus themselves on the source of true joy instead of merely stopping at the circumstances on their lives.
The first brother James exhorts is the poor and lowly brother. James tells him in verse 9, “Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation.” That is, the brother whose trials have brought him to a place where he is lowly in the world. Perhaps he is poor, lacking prestige, and without the praise of men. What does he focus on to know joy? James says that he should boast or rejoice in his exaltation. That is, he can rejoice that he is in Christ and will be raised. He doesn’t have to look simply at the things this world tells us are causes for rejoicing. He can consider his exaltation, his place with Christ.
On the other hand, the rich brother is in a challenging place as well with his place in the world. Just as the lowly brother’s state in the world might cause him to miss the blessing he has in Christ, so the rich man’s state in the world might cause him to miss the blessing he has in Christ. Therefore, James exhorts the rich man not to glory and boast and rejoice in his riches, but in the fact that he has been united with one who was despised and rejected, who bore the persecution of the world, one who had no place to lay his head. James tells “the rich” to rejoice or boast “in his humiliation.”
And the reason this must be the cause of his rejoicing is because some day all of his riches will go away. James writes, “Because like a flower of the grass he will pass away. For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass; its flower falls, and its beauty perishes. So also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits” (vv. 10-11).
The person who sets his joy simply on the riches of this world will one day pass away. All of his pursuits will prove meaningless. Therefore, in some way, both our poverty and our riches present us with a trial. And in each place, we will make a misstep if we focus more on our circumstances than on the God who is inviting us to cling more tightly to him, to realize our need for him more deeply, and to cherish what he is doing for our eternal good. God’s work, in and through our trials, is the source of our joy whether we have riches or poverty in this life.
Therefore, how is it that we hold together the suffering and trials we consistently face in this life with the unmistakable certainty of God’s love for us? James’ answer is that we recognize that God’s work in and through our trials, shaping us, growing our faith so that we persevere, and moving to cling more closely and tightly to him so that on that final day we might be found perfect and complete, lacking nothing. And until that day, as we lack wisdom, he delights in us asking him for it and will not scold us as we ask.
Therefore, as we take a moment of silence this morning before coming to the table, let us consider the work of God’s faithfulness in our life. Let our trials remind us that God will not let us go, but is making sure that we persevere in faith. And, as we consider this, let us also ask God for wisdom from a heart that longs to obey him. How can we doubt God’s care for us, commitment to us, and willingness to give us what we need when he sent his Son to live for us, die for our sins, and be raised for us so that we might have forgiveness and life? After a time of silence, then, we will proclaim his death as our hope as we come to the table. Amen.