Well, it\u2019s time to start again.\u00a0 On January 1st no one writing columns really knows how to say anything new.\u00a0 As a pastor who must preach a fresh sermon every Christmas and Easter and all the other holidays, and has been doing it for most of my life, I can tell you I repeat myself a lot.\u00a0 You know the man who only comes to church on those two holidays and leaves saying, \u201cpastor, you preach the same thing every time I come to church.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 So as I start the 24th year of writing Aletheia you may want to just put it down and say, \u201che said this last year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Do you remember January 1, 2000, or Y2K?\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t really the start of a new millennium yet, but the world was changing from writing 1900 to writing 2000.\u00a0 Well, some gearhead somewhere told us that all computers in the world could not handle the automatic change in those digits and would instantly jam and shut down.\u00a0 It was pointed out that almost everything in our lives has a computer chip in it and therefore will instantly quit working at midnight of the new year.\u00a0 The computer in your car, your microwave, your watch, your pacemaker; the computer that runs the city power grid and the one that runs the water works; all of Washington, the Pentagon, the White House (yes, there was some disappointment in its failure here), and even Big Ben and Greenwich Meridian Time.\u00a0 All of these were supposed to stop and, of course, the world as we know it would come crashing to a halt.\u00a0 Some were actually disappointed when the world went right on instead of reverting back to outhouses and wood stoves.\u00a0 Talk about New Year articles being a bummer!\u00a0 Ironically, the year 2000 started, not with a computer glitch, but with good old, manual, \u201changing chad.\u201d\u00a0 It was probably a natural harbinger of things to come in the next decade.<\/p>\n
This year we kind of have a Y2K politically which will start on January 20th when a different kind of President, at least from what we\u2019ve known in our life time, is sworn into office.\u00a0 Since November 8th, or make that 9th, we have been receiving warnings of coming doom and gloom, or, on the other hand, of the golden age itself.\u00a0 I would imagine that either side is going to experience quite a bit of disappointment that it doesn\u2019t happen as predicted.<\/p>\n
Then there was Harold Camping. Even Wickipedia proudly (or maybe disappointingly) reports, \u201cCamping predicted that\u00a0Jesus Christ\u00a0would return to Earth\u00a0on May 21, 2011, whereupon the\u00a0saved\u00a0would be taken up to heaven in the\u00a0rapture, and that there would follow five months of\u00a0fire, brimstone\u00a0and plagues on Earth, with millions of people dying each day, culminating on October 21, 2011, with the final destruction of the world.\u201d\u00a0 Poor Harold died in 2012\u2014the fate of all writers who go a little overboard predicting what is going to happen next year.<\/p>\n
Isaac Watts, my favorite song writer of all time, wrote a little known hymn which he titled, \u201cBegin, My Tongue, Some Heavenly Theme,\u201d and continues in the second line, \u201cAnd speak some boundless thing\u201d (see the rest at the conclusion of this article).\u00a0 Since I don\u2019t have boundless things to speak, I am going to let the last two chapters of James speak for me.\u00a0 Am always enticed by 4:13-17 where James says to his people, \u201cGo to now, ye that say, Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain.\u201d Then James continues, \u201cFor that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.\u201d\u00a0 This admonition to approach the next year with God\u2019s will in mind rests in the middle of the last two chapters both of which move our attention in the right direction.<\/p>\n
Friendship with the world is the enemy of\u00a0 God (4:1-12)<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYe have not, because ye ask not.\u00a0 Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.\u00a0 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God?\u00a0 Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.\u201d\u00a0 Pretty tough language!\u00a0 We know that the Bible uses the word \u201cworld\u201d in a few different ways and that here it means that worldly system of which Satan is the god and people are his subjects\u2014sometimes evidently even believers.<\/p>\n When believers, who actually belong to Christ and are no longer legal subjects to Satan, love the world it causes the Holy Spirit Who dwells within to \u201cyearn jealously\u201d (vs. 5).\u00a0 Though James attributes this to \u201cthe scripture,\u201d\u00a0 we have no Old Testament verse that says it exactly.\u00a0 I think the study Bibles are correct in referencing Genesis 6:3, which says, \u201cMy Spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh.\u201d\u00a0 James next tells us that God \u201cgiveth more grace.\u201d\u00a0 This could be his analogy to Noah in Genesis 6:8, \u201cBut Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.\u201d\u00a0 With the end of the old world coming, when \u201cevery imagination of the thoughts of men\u2019s heart was only evil continually,\u201d\u00a0 it was imperative for the believers to look ahead and live by grace.\u00a0 The friends of that world tragically died in the flood.<\/p>\n Seek God\u2019s will for the year ahead (4:13-17)<\/span><\/p>\n James, the pastor of the church in Jerusalem and the first New Testament writer, had to warn his people about their new year\u2019s resolutions.\u00a0 The book of Acts indicates that these were tough times for the believers because of persecution (11:19) and increasing recession due to famine (11:27-30).\u00a0 It was only natural for the people to make financial goals for the coming year.\u00a0 They would go here and there, do this and that, and make some money.\u00a0 But they had left out the most important consideration,\u00a0 \u201cFor that ye ought to say, if the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.\u00a0 But now ye rejoice in your boastings:\u00a0 all such rejoicing is evil.\u00a0 Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin\u201d (4:15-17).<\/p>\n It is a \u201csin\u201d for us both to leave God out of our plans and also to run contrary to His will when we know better.\u00a0 There is something in us here that makes us gravitate toward our own selfishness, especially when we can \u201cconsume it upon our own lusts.\u201d<\/p>\n This world is no friend of grace (5:1-6)<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cGo to now, you rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you!\u201d\u00a0 If a time of famine was coming, and evidently it was, the rich people were about to enter a recession or even a great depression.\u00a0 But God did not have pity because they had \u201ckept back by fraud\u201d the wages of honest workers (4).\u00a0 \u201cYe have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.\u00a0 Ye have condemned the just; and he doth not resist you\u201d (5-6).<\/p>\n Believers cannot always count on unbelievers to be honest with them, though the believer ought always to be hard working and honest regardless of his or her working situation.\u00a0 Natural law speaks to all parties involved, but inspired Law speaks even more to Christians.\u00a0 Why would we want this part of the \u201cworld\u201d to love us when, in fact, it can\u2019t love us.\u00a0 Jesus said to the unbelievers of His day, \u201cThe world cannot hate you; but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil\u201d (John 7:7).\u00a0 A generation who loves the world so much that it seeks its love rather than rebuke is not a friend of God.<\/p>\n Take the long look (5:7-11)<\/span><\/p>\n This section in James begins, \u201cBe patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord.\u201d\u00a0 Let me point out the language here, at the risk of being boring.\u00a0 \u201cPatience\u201d (as a noun) almost always comes from the Greek word hupomonee<\/i>, to remain under a burden or trial.\u00a0 The verb, hupomeno<\/i>, is usually translated \u201cendure\u201d because it admonishes us to remain under our trial with this patience.\u00a0 But \u201cpatience\u201d here in the three times it appears in James 5:7-10, does not come from hupomonee<\/i>, but from makrothumia<\/i>, which is almost always translated \u201clongsuffering.\u201d\u00a0 I think that would be a much better translation here instead of \u201cpatience\u201d although virtually no common translation does it.<\/p>\n James is directing the reader\u2019s attention, in all three cases, to the \u201ccoming of the Lord,\u201d \u201cfor the coming of the Lord draweth nigh,\u201d and because, \u201cthe judge standeth before the door.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, the admonition is more than just patience, it is also looking far ahead to the time when we see the Lord!\u00a0 Makrothumia<\/i> is a combination of two words: makro<\/i>, meaning long, and thumia<\/i>, meaning desire.\u00a0 The same root with a different prefix, epi<\/i>, meaning short, or short desire, is usually translated lust.\u00a0 Having a long desire is good and gives us the word longsuffering.\u00a0 Having a short desire is not good and gives us the word lust.\u00a0 We should be longsuffering in this world because the Lord is coming one day.<\/p>\n How should we approach 2017?<\/span><\/p>\n Here are a few of the things believers should be paying attention to and being aware of in the new year.<\/p>\n Promoting the Lord more than ourselves<\/span>.\u00a0 \u201cFor not he that commendeth himself is approved, but whom the Lord commendeth\u201d (2 Cor. 10:18).\u00a0 It seems like everything on line, on TV, in sports, in theater, in music, is about the performer, and this is too often the case in God\u2019s church.\u00a0 There are so many ways in which we can feed this tendency for the \u201cpride of life\u201d that we must be especially aware of it.<\/p>\n The world does not operate from the perspective of being fallen creatures.\u00a0 To the average person, the exalting of self is a good thing, it is a way to get ahead, to get oneself noticed.\u00a0 Even humility is generally used as a way to gain a compliment.\u00a0 And why shouldn\u2019t they think like this if there is no higher Authority in one\u2019s life?\u00a0 Still, we know better.\u00a0 As Paul prefaces that verse, \u201cBut he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord\u201d (2 Cor. 10:17).<\/p>\n Furthering the gospel more than good deeds<\/span>.\u00a0 Of course, we know that when we present the gospel that it is a gospel of grace not works.\u00a0 But I am thinking from the sinner\u2019s point of view.\u00a0 There are many good things to do in this world and we all should be busy with them as much as possible:\u00a0 helping the helpless, comforting the weak, lifting up the downhearted.\u00a0 The world, however, sees these as an end in themselves.\u00a0 The \u201creal\u201d meaning of Christmas, as we have seen, becomes the gift of giving.\u00a0 The \u201creal\u201d meaning of love is to never give up.\u00a0 In the old modernistic way, the real meaning of Christianity is to follow Christ\u2019s example and to be like Him, since He was the great Example.<\/p>\n All of these good works are good but they lack one thing:\u00a0 being the result of a new birth and not the way to a new birth.\u00a0 The politically correct world is fine with the good works, but they don\u2019t like to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ.\u00a0 In fact, the gospel is almost outlawed in free societies.\u00a0 With all of our good deeds, let\u2019s not neglect the most important thing, the need for saving faith.<\/p>\n Using our time wisely<\/span>.\u00a0 I think we must all feel the contradiction of living in the most convenient time in history, and yet being chronic time wasters.\u00a0 Never have we needed more to be, \u201cRedeeming the time, because the days are evil\u201d (Eph. 5:16).\u00a0 No doubt, in many ways modern conveniences save a lot of time.\u00a0 Just think of flying across country rather than driving, and driving rather than riding a horse!\u00a0 I am writing this article and will send it out by email which will reach anywhere in the world instantly.\u00a0 I just took a break from writing to heat my cold coffee in 30 seconds in the microwave.\u00a0 I just texted my brother-in-law across the country to remind him to cheer for my football team in tonight\u2019s game.\u00a0 Grandpa would not have believed it.<\/p>\n The problem with the gadget age is that we love gadgets.\u00a0 My wife and I play word games on our phones with our kids in four different time zones, but these games can go on all evening!\u00a0 I can read texts, emails, and Facebook all afternoon while half a dozen good books sit next to my chair without ever being opened.\u00a0 And (the chronic time waster of my life time) kids can watch virtually any program in the world for hours at a time and not have time to finish their homework.\u00a0 Should I go on?<\/p>\n Somehow our forefathers managed to read more, write more, build more, even attend church more.\u00a0 Maybe the biggest challenge in time management is ourselves, and it is a constant battle.<\/p>\n Keeping the main things the main things<\/span>.\u00a0 At the first of the year we all need to be reminded of the essentials of the Christian life: prayer, Bible reading, church attendance, witnessing, and doing the things necessary for a close walk with God.\u00a0 I\u2019m not talking about simply going through the motions without applying ourselves.\u00a0 These things are commanded of us in the Scripture.\u00a0 They are like food and water, clothing and shelter.\u00a0 These we ought to have done, and not left the others undone.<\/p>\n With all the advantages of the modern conveniences and the ability to work on the go, to communicate instantly, there is something good and settling about establishing patterns and times and habits for these basic Christian virtues.\u00a0 Sometimes we just have to turn everything else off and sit in a chair in a quiet room with our Bible in our laps (even if it\u2019s an electronic Bible).\u00a0 And what about our kids and grandkids?\u00a0 Life will get even busier for them and they need to see biblical priorities in us.\u00a0 We need to leave those footprints in the sands of our time and pray that generations will follow wisely until the Lord comes.<\/p>\n And So . . . <\/b><\/p>\n Having said more than enough to begin a new year, let me end with the rest of Watts\u2019 old song.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know how he accomplished so much living in the 15th and 16th centuries, but may we match his enthusiam in ours.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Begin, My Tongue, Some Heavenly Theme<\/b> (Isaac Watts, 1674-1748)<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n Begin, my tongue, some heav\u2019nly theme,<\/p>\n And speak some boundless thing\u2014<\/p>\n The mighty works or mightier name<\/p>\n Of our eternal King.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Tell of His wondrous faith-ful-ness<\/p>\n And sound His pow\u2019r a-broad;<\/p>\n Sing the sweet prom-ise of His grace,<\/p>\n The love and truth of God.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n His very word of grace is strong<\/p>\n As that which built the skies;<\/p>\n The voice that rolls the stars a-long<\/p>\n Speaks all the prom-is-es.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n O might I hear Thy heav\u2019n-ly tongue<\/p>\n But whis-per, \u201cThou art Mine!\u201d<\/p>\n Those gentle words should raise my song<\/p>\n To notes al-most di-vine.*<\/p><\/blockquote>\n *These verses still appear in Great Hymns of the Faith.\u00a0 <\/i>Six other verses appear in his original version (in Songs and Hymns of Isaac Watts<\/i>).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Well, it\u2019s time to start again.\u00a0 On January 1st no one writing columns really knows how to say anything new.\u00a0 As a pastor who must preach a fresh sermon every Christmas and Easter and all the other holidays, and has been doing it for most of my life, I can tell you I repeat myself 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