The Birth of Iniquity

Yes, people would take their
Bible and turn once again to the pistol of Jesus. One of the greatest joys of life
is the birth of a new baby. And just the gift of life, we
always rejoice. We always rejoice at the birth
of a healthy newborn baby. But let’s be honest. Not all
babies are as beautiful as the grandmother thinks they are,
right? And there are times where we
have perhaps come across a baby and perhaps the first thought
in our mind is, what an ugly baby. We wouldn’t hardly think of uttering
such a phrase, but James doesn’t hold back. James doesn’t hold
back using the same illustration of the birth of a baby. James
doesn’t hesitate to call the baby that he has in view an ugly
baby. It is a horribly ugly baby. It
is without a doubt the ugliest baby ever born on the face of
the earth. It is the baby that he will soon
identify as sin itself, iniquity. We come again to this section
of scripture where James has been discussing at length trials. It started in verse two, it will
course all the way down to verse 21. James is dealing with the
Christian and the challenge that the Christian has to live Christianly. He’s worried about the faith,
the appropriate exercise, the living out of one’s faith. And so James, in dealing with
trials, has dealt with the positive aspect of trials, that trials
are sent by God, we literally fall into them, but they are there by God’s provision
and purpose. But there is a difficult side
to trials, that if they are mishandled, if they are not appropriated
correctly, If we don’t look to God for grace in the midst of
those trials, they soon and quickly become temptations. Those temptations
lead ultimately to sin. Sin has consequence, as James
will lay out to us with all clarity. For our purposes this morning,
if you would consider all the way back to James, chapter 1
verse 2 We’ll take a running start at this passage this morning
James chapter 1 beginning of verse 2 and will course all the
way down through verse 16 Consider it all joy my brethren when you
encounter various trials knowing that the testing of your faith
produces endurance and And let endurance have its perfect result,
so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives
to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given
to him. But he must ask in faith without
any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the
sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For that man ought not
to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being
a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. But the brother
of humble circumstances is to glory in his high position, and
the rich man is to glory in his humiliation, because like the
flowering grass, he will pass away. For the sun rises with
a scorching wind and withers the grass and its flower falls
off and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed. So to the rich
man in the midst of his pursuits will fade away. Blessed is the
man who perseveres under trial for once he has been approved
he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised
to those who love him. Let no one say when he is tempted,
I am being tempted by God. For God cannot be tempted by
evil, and he himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is
tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived,
it gives birth to sin. And when sin is accomplished,
it brings forth death. Do not be deceived. My beloved
brethren, James has presented in full the
positive element of Trials, they’re God-given They’re crafted by
God. They’re designed for our good.
They’re designed to Cultivate character in us as it forces
us to our knees and upon God’s grace the trials are designed
by God to weed out the sin in our lives and to ultimately cultivate
what James refers to as endurance they they have a absolutely positive
design in God’s heart. We saw last Lord’s Day that these
trials, that for those who persevere in them and through them, for
those who appropriate God’s grace, there is a blessing to be enjoyed,
blessed, Oh, how very happy is the man who perseveres under
a God-given trial, for once he has been approved, that’s the
goal, once God has tested him and he has been found true, he
has been found faithful, he has been found precisely what God
had designed him to be. Once he has been approved, he
will receive the crown of life. That was our passage last Lord’s
Day. But the passage before us this day, still in that great
theme of trials and testings, still in that great theme of
examining the believer’s faith, takes the uncomfortable position,
the position that nobody wants to talk about, the position that acknowledges the ugly baby,
that sometimes trials are not handled correctly. Sometimes
we shake our fist at God. We develop an inner animosity
towards him. We are frustrated. We’re even
bitter and angry at God for the experience through which he’s
taking us. And as a result, our heart and
not being right, lashes out at God, begins to blame God, begins
to assign evil motives to God, not only is the endurance postponed,
now comes into question even the believer with regards to
his faith. Is he even a believer as such?
I would suggest to you that as you read verses 13 through 15,
There is good cause to wonder whether this individual is even
saved We’ll look at that in a moment The individual who shakes his
fist at God who blames God for all of life’s difficulties and
challenges God accordingly Not only does he miss the endurance.
I Would suggest to you that likely he identifies himself as an unbeliever I want to present to you this
morning the birth of iniquity, the ugly baby in James’s view,
where James begins to expose the origin of sin. First and foremost, if you jump
all the way back to verse 13, the first thing that James wants
to do is correct an error. He wants to correct an error
in our thinking, and I say our because I think that this is
a very common error. Look at verse 13, let no one
say. And I would suggest to you that
just even those words mean that this was probably a frequently
bandied about idea. that of God being the author
of sin. That maybe somehow behind it
all, if my theology isn’t squared away, maybe I can pin this on
God himself. And James deals with the popularity
of it when he says, stop this. Let no one say. Nobody should
have this crazy idea that sin is God’s fault. Let no one say
when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God. Those words should
never fall from a Christian’s mouth. It should never be uttered
by any human. So James wants to jump into what
we might call the pathology of temptation. Pathology is the
study of disease. It’s the study of its cause and
effect. And we need to understand the
cause and the effect of sin itself. Where did it come from? Why is
it there? Why do we do the things that
we do when God has specifically admonished us not to do those
things? First of all, look at the word
tempted. It’s the same exact word. It’s the same exact word
that we’ve used previously, verses two through four, for trial.
A trial can become a temptation, as I’ve already said. Hear the
word, and you have to look at the context, each specific context,
to know exactly how the writer is using this word. Here, the context clearly points
to the idea of temptation and not the more general use translated
as trial. God, we have seen, verses two
through four, does send trials. They originate from his throne. They originate by his design. They originate for his purpose
in our lives. But God’s designed trials are
never created to trip us up. They’re never created to cause
us to fail. Temptations are just the opposite.
When the world, even as we saw in our Bible study this last
week, or the flesh, or even the devil himself brings temptation
into our lives, the purpose is always to trip us up. Temptation
always has peril associated with it. Temptation is always designed
to provoke and to bring about a sinful response. It is particularly designed to
cause us to stumble and fall and fail. So James, James has
already used this word to suggest that God does send trials, but
he does not send these temptations. God sends trials for the purpose
of testing and proving our faith. God does not use temptation to
evil. First Corinthians 10, 13, we
looked at this verse several weeks ago, and in concert with
our consideration of verses two through four, no temptation has
overtaken you, but such as is common to man, even temptations
themselves aren’t necessary occasions for sinning. Did you hear what
I said? They’re temptations, they are
just that at the moment. when we begin to sweat and palpitate
and think more and more about acting upon this forbidden thing. Paul there says, no temptation
has overtaken you but such as is common to man. It is a familiar
path that we walk. It is a well-worn path, this
path towards sin. And God is faithful. He will
not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able. There is nothing
God has ever placed in our path that insisted that we fall. But with that temptation, Paul
says, will provide the way of escape also. We can step back and look at
the epistle of James and know that many believers in this great
Christian community, in this fledgling church of Jerusalem,
Many of them had succumbed to their trials. They had turned
their God-given trials into occasions of temptation. They had failed
to show any consistency in their life of faith. These are exactly
the people to whom James now is speaking and speaking about. They had succumbed. They had
given in They had turned a trial into temptation and ultimately
into sin, and then worse. Maybe under the course of persecution,
maybe under the difficulties that were inherent to that first
century church, many looked about them, saw God as being inconsistent,
untrustworthy, and why not sin? My Christianity isn’t working.
And they had begun to murmur and complain against God Himself. And James says, stop it. Let
no one, not even a single one of you, not one of you has a
cause against God. Not one of you would be justified
to raise your fist and complain against God Himself. Note that he says, even the nature
of this address There were probably those even in the midst of this
situation. Let not one of you, no one say
when he is tempted. Without a doubt, there are those
in our midst that are in the midst of trial. And we know from
human nature, there are those in our midst that are in the
midst of temptation. The possibility is very real
that they will cast God aside for a moment, refuse to draw
on His grace, succumb to the temptation, and do what they
want to do. Such is human nature. That when
we are tempted, we begin to mutter and murmur against God. Temptation
becomes solicits a solicitation to sin It becomes an invitation
when it’s not appropriate Handled appropriately and and when God’s
grace is not appropriated to that end and The first thing that comes
is a tendency to blame others, isn’t it? One commentator said, perverse
human nature is ever prone to blame someone else for its sins. I’ve noted for years this development
over time. I think it started probably with
alcoholism, but there’s a modern psychological approach to counseling
that basically endorses blaming anybody else for your misdeeds,
your sins, your troubles, your trials, anybody but yourself. Look to anyone. It could be your
father in your upbringing. It could be your environment.
Blame anyone but yourself. Take no personal responsibility. And that just feeds the natural
inclination of humanity that in the midst of our sinful tendencies,
to exonerate ourselves of any guilt. After all, it was, see
if you’ve tried this one, the company in which I was in. I
was in the midst of wretched men, troublesome company. Their influence is without a
doubt evil. God warns us of the perils
of keeping bad company, and that much is true. But I used to wonder
about this when I would hear moms especially use this excuse,
he fell in with bad company. I used to always wonder, how
do we know who was the bad company? How do we know it wasn’t your
own son who was bad company? So the fault is often laid at
anybody other than the individual. We’ve heard it recently blamed. We blame heredity. I was born
this way. This is my inclination. I can’t
help myself. Unfavorable circumstances, poverty,
riches, the fact that I’m white, the fact that I’m black, the
fact that I was born here in this country, or the fact that
I was born elsewhere. All of those things people utilize
as excuses to cover over their sinful habit. One pastor pointed to blame their
anger on the fact that they were provoked. They blame their foul
mouths on the fact that others encouraged and modeled for them
this behavior so that it just became second nature to them. Likewise with all kinds of other
sins. We see others doing it. We take
that as some kind of an endorsement, a free pass to do likewise. And when all is said and done,
We stand and want to point our finger at them. But I want you to note in this
passage, it isn’t just a general tendency to blame anybody outside
of our own skin. Look at the passage. Let no one
say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God. That’s
the one that we most often blame. James identifies the one we most
often blame when he says, I’m being tempted by God. Ralph Wardlaw,
a Puritan commentator, said that this is one of the most fearful
palliations of sin and opiates to the conscience that the deceitful
heart of man has ever suggested. Let me explain that just a little
bit. I got an email earlier this week
that a friend is in Hospice care. Hospice care is when the medical
community seeks to stop trying to save and preserve life and
now is just going to palliate the pain. They’re just going
to give something for the pain and allow nature to take its
course. That’s the way that he’s using
this word. that this tendency to blame God for everything is
one of the most fearful palliations of sin. It’s a drug, essentially
Wardlaw says, or it functions like a drug to allow the person
to defer any personal responsibility and to deflect it and to blame
of all people God himself. The other illustration that he
uses there is an opiate to the conscience. Again, using the
idea of a drug to override the conscience when the conscience
tells the individual who really is at the core of blame that
instead conscience is quieted, conscience is shushed, and instead
God is put in the crosshairs. And we know this, this pattern
started very early, didn’t it? Started with Adam and Eve. When
Adam blamed God for the woman whom thou gavest me. She’s the
one. And then Eve in turn blames,
you know, the snake. We blame heredity. We blame poverty. We blame bad friends. We blame
the devil. And the devil certainly has a
hand. He likes nothing better than
to get you to foul up. And he doesn’t mind at the end
whether he’s exonerated and God is blamed. All the better. The
devil is the tempter. That is the devil’s job. And
other times the devil has many helpers, not just henchmen, the
demons, but he has human helpers. Paul says they not only do the
same, they give hearty approval to those who practice those evil
things. Misery does love company. But you know what’s true? It
doesn’t matter whether it’s the world or the flesh or the devil,
no one can make you sin. No one. Not even the devil himself
can make you sin. In the end, it comes down to
you. It comes down to you standing
before God, drawing on his grace. Or when you sin, you’re gonna
turn on your heels and blame him. Proverbs 19 echoes that same
tendency, the foolishness of man ruins his way. You think
of the lives that have been ruined through poor choice. The foolishness of man ruins
his way, but the rest of the proverb goes like this, and his
heart rages against the Lord. That’s a tendency of humanity,
isn’t it? In fact, There are many commentators that looked
at this passage and wondered whether James wasn’t dealing
with a heresy that was already beginning to bubble up in this
young Christian community, trying to pin on the Lord Jesus Christ’s
own words some sinful exemption. When Jesus preached the Sermon
on the Mount, taught the disciples to pray, and he said, do not
lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. And so
there is at least the suggestion, and the early church took it
and ran with it, that it was a possibility for God to verily
lead them into temptation right up to the edge of the cliff itself. But the truth is the root of
sinfulness lies deep within. and blaming God is utterly foolish. One pastor said, you see, we
do not fear men that are as faulty as ourselves. They need pardon
as well as we, and therefore it is that the soul does so wickedly
designed to bring God into partnership and fellowship of our guilt,
to blemish the being of God by polluting and profaning his glory. For since we cannot raise out
the sense of the deity, we would destroy the dread and reverence
of it. What a powerful thought. This
is our way of bringing God down to our level and saying, see
what you did. See what you did by making me
the way that I am, with giving me this weakness, by giving me
these friends, by putting me in this situation, see what you
did. And so we charge God with sin.
We blame His providence. We blame our condition, the state
of our being, the state of our existence. We blame the times. Remember Habakkuk shaking his
fist, as it were, at God, wondering, what are you doing? We blame the people around us.
We blame circumstances. We blame anything. But the worst
of all is when we blame God. God gave me this desire. God put me in this predicament. Robert Johnstone, our hero, faithful,
godly man, said it this way, all such fancies, all attempts
of every kind to throw off ourselves from the responsibility for our
sins are delusions of the devil to draw us to destruction. Did
you hear what he says until you take responsibility for your
sin? You’re on the road to hell you’re
on the road to destruction It is wrong thinking It is hellish thinking By nothing in our Constitution
Did you hear what Johnstone says? There’s nothing in you that makes
you sin. By nothing in our Constitution,
by nothing in the circumstance in which God’s providence has
placed us, or the influences which He permits to act upon
us, are we laid under a necessity of sinning. Ever. There isn’t
anything that can provoke us from God’s hand to sinning, where
we can exonerate ourselves at the end of it and say, You share
at least part of the blame in this. Never. He goes on to say,
reason has been given to us, and truth revealed to guide the
reason, to hold the animal passions under control, and to derive
for the service of God helps, not hindrances, from circumstances
of every kind. We may, if we would, shun sin
and we sin simply because we choose to sin. Isn’t that a clear way of looking
at it? We had the option. We had the freedom. We had the
grace. We had the word of God. We had
the Holy Spirit. We have all manner of believing
friends about us. We did not have to sin and we
sinned. And James says, first and foremost,
you better correct your thinking. Don’t ever wag your finger. Don’t
ever blame God for your sin. And then he explains it. Look at the verse again. Let
no one say when he is tempted, I’m being tempted by God, for
God cannot be tempted by evil. And he himself does not tempt
anyone. That word translated there for
evil is kekon, It just means morally base, degrading. It is utterly worthless, vile,
putrid. It is the complete opposite of
good. But this particular word that
he uses, untemptable, It isn’t found anywhere else in the New
Testament. In fact, you know what? It isn’t found anywhere
else in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament.
This is another one of those words in which our creative friend
James likely made up himself. That God himself is untemptable. And if we think about God, we
know that to be true, don’t we? If we know what God is really
like, we know that God is untemptable by evil. We know that He doesn’t
have evil inclinations. We know that He doesn’t have
a weak constitution. We know that He doesn’t have
a problem that doesn’t stop our human nature. A.W. Pink said that God, so-called,
quote-unquote, which the vast majority of professing Christians
love, They’ve made an idol is what he’s saying. This so-called
false God is looked upon very much like an indulgent old man
who himself has no relish for folly, but leniently winks at
the indiscretions of youth. Isn’t that incredible description
of the common perspective of God? That he’s this old guy up
there that even though he wouldn’t enter into our reindeer games,
he understands it and brushes it aside as no big deal. When
God himself is said to be infinitely holy. It is completely contrary
to God’s character as an infinitely good, inherently good God that
he would have anything to do with anything evil, with anything
sinful. And so God, James says, cannot
be tempted to do evil. And tempting someone to fall
into sin would be an evil act in and of itself. God himself is absolutely insusceptible
to evil. He is untemptable. His character
is perfectly pure and holy. I love the way Louis Burkhoff
describes God’s holiness. He says the scriptural idea of
the holiness of God is twofold. In its original sense, it denotes
that he is absolutely distinct from all creatures. Do you remember
a couple weeks ago when I said we’re taking back, we’re declaring
that we are taking back the word saints. from the Roman Catholic
Church. That’s essentially what it means,
separated out for God. But in a very real way, God is
separated out from his creation. God is separate and distinct
from his creation. But the holiness of God also
has an ethical element to it, as Burkoff points out. It’s a
separation from moral evil or sin. God can have no communion
with sin. God has no fellowship, affectionate
fellowship with sin. That makes holiness, he says,
not merely a passive, pardon me, not merely a negative, that
means a separation from sin, but it is a positive aspect of
His will, moral excellence, ethical perfection. It is, and this is
so classic, the way he does this. It is that perfection of God
in virtue of which he eternally wills and maintains his own moral
excellence, abhors sin, and demands purity in his moral characters. How could you ever wag your finger
at God and blame him for your sin? God isn’t the author. God doesn’t
endorse it. God didn’t cause it. And so the first thing that James
does in this course of exposing the origin of sin, this ugly
baby, the first thing he does is correct this error. Don’t
blame it on God. Secondly, the second means of
exposing the origin of sin is the explanation of the truth.
And the truth is that there are stages to this sin. Look at verses 14 and 15. But
each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his
own lust. Then when lust is conceived it
gives birth to sin and when sin is accomplished it brings forth
death. You heard three stages to this sin. First stage. Our own lust lures us into temptation. This is the step that if I had
to pick one word for it, I’d call it savoring, right? Where you’re just savoring the
very idea of this thing, and maybe you have no intent whatsoever,
but you are thinking on it, you are pondering it. Each one is
tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. It’s a fascinating image that
he uses here. I had a conversation with a friend
of mine a couple of weeks ago where, alas, I was identified
as a bait fisherman. They’re not really highly regarded
in the fishing community. And so there is at least hope
for me that I can be taught and trained to try it another way.
But that’s the image that’s here, that of a bait fisherman who
uses bait, dangles it in front of a fish’s nose. The fish takes the bait and is
ultimately carried away. Peter uses it twice in his second
epistle, speaking of those just vile false teachers that live
as immorally as their doctrine. 2 Peter 2.14, having eyes full
of adultery that never cease from sin, enticing, using bait
to dangle before the nose of another, enticing unstable souls. 2 Peter 2.18, he says, they entice
by fleshly desires. Now, I mean, I know this practice. When I was a kid, we used to
catch crawdads, and I figured out a genius means of doing so,
in case you’re hungry. What you do is you get a jar,
and you put some ham in the jar. I see kids taking notes now.
You put some ham or some kind of meat in the jar. Hot dog works
fine. You tie a rope around the neck
of the jar and you just submerge the jar gently to the bottom
and within a few minutes, the bigger the mouth on the jar,
that’s what you want. You want the lobster guys. The big guys
that weigh something when you catch them. That’s exactly the
image that we have here. That we’re captured and caught. when we go after the bait. And we take it hook, line, and
sinker. These words were used specifically
of fishing and hunting. Ultimately, they’re used by the
writer of Proverbs to speak of that evil woman. But it suggests
this idea of going to the water, dangling the bait, Taking a fish In fact there was a well-known
rabbinical proverb That this was so commonplace that the rabbis
would speak of it and in terms So popular that many think that
this is the idea that James was countering here Or that James
rather was playing up on The proverb went like this, as a
man throws out a net whereby he catches the fish of the sea,
so the sins of man become the means of engaging and catching
the sinner. That’s true. And James is just
playing on that illustration that the soul begins to savor
this bait. You can smell the bait from a
long way away and he begins to think on it and desire it and
ponder it. And even though he hasn’t acted
on the sin yet, he’s lingering and far too long. Note that James calls it that
he’s, each one is tempted and when he’s carried away and enticed,
look at this, by his own lust. It’s not God. Can’t blame God,
can’t blame the way God made you. your weak constitution. It isn’t anything from outside
of your being that this takes place. It starts from deep down
within. It’s you. Each one is tempted
when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Lust is that desire of our heart
and mind that dallies between a moment of innocence and the
exercise of some sinful action. It’s the pondering moment. It’s
the savoring moment. It’s when the mind is caught
between what one said is the first entrance of the sinful
thought and the actual commission of the evil. It’s that moment
in between. It’s that moment where God says
there’s a door in 1 Corinthians 10, 13. There’s a way of escape. And the enticement begins there.
It begins working on our appetites and our desires. It’s fascinating
to note and important, I think, to note that this word translated
lust here isn’t always a bad It doesn’t always have a bad
connotation. Context has to inform it. In fact, do you know that Jesus
used this word of himself? Luke 22, 15, he said to them,
I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before
I suffer. I mean, if we had to, we could
translate that. I lust, I earnestly desire to eat this Passover with
you brothers. In fact, 1 Timothy 3 uses it
of elders, doesn’t it? It’s a trustworthy statement.
If any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work
he desires to do. It should be a passionate longing
to care for the sheep. And so it’s not, not only is
it not always a bad word, It’s not always taken in the sense
of a moral impurity, a sensual necessarily desire. It’s a sinful
desire of any kind that he’s pointing to. Any pleasure that
we enjoy outside of God’s blessing. And that’s a problem because
as we learned some months ago, the four effects of the fall,
remember them? Adam and Eve are there in the
garden. They commit the sin. And marching out of the garden,
they suffered four effects with the fall. Inherently sinful,
temporally vexed, physically dying, and spiritually dead.
But it’s that first one that comes into play with this particular
thing, because how can we trust ourselves when we are now inherently
sinful? We are As Genesis 6, 5 said, the Lord saw that the wickedness
of man was great in the earth and that every intent of the
thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Superlative
after superlative to describe our sinful tendencies. Lorraine
Bettner said it this way, natural men are apostates from the womb. If we don’t know Christ, our
backs are toward God. Our eyes are on our own desires. Natural men are apostates from
the womb. As soon as they are born, they
go astray, speaking lies. They are shapen in iniquity,
conceived in sin. The propensity of their heart
is evil from their youth. It is out of their heart that
all the issues of life proceed. Acts of sin are therefore the
expression of the natural heart Which is deceitful above all
things and exceedingly corrupt? Paul tells us that doesn’t he
in Romans 3? and that anthology of the Psalms, looking back at
all the ways that the Psalms start by saying, there is no
one good, not even one, and it leads Paul to the conclusion
in 23, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. So
how can we trust ourselves? How can we trust our own conscience
to exonerate our guilt on a particular act? The longer we ponder it,
the more likely we are to engage, whatever the sin is. That led one pastor to put it
in simple terms, sin is the result of surrender of the will to the
soliciting of lustful desire instead of the guidance of reason.
Instead of listening to our conscience, instead of listening to that
verse that was recited to us in Sunday school, instead of
listening to the counsel of a godly friend, In itself, he says, desire may
be natural and innocent. It is when the man resolves to
gratify it against what he feels to be the higher law of duty,
that he becomes guilty of sin even before he carries out his
resolve to act. In other words, he says, your
sinful thought, your sinful thought pattern, your sinful thinking
has betrayed you. It has led you right up to the
cliff and now is ready to give one last shove. James looks at those engaged
in all their various duties, sees the way people are operating,
and he says, you’re only tempted by your own desires. Stage two. I told you there were
three stages of sin. Our own lust lures us into temptation. That’s what I would call the
savoring stage. Temptation produces sin. That’s what I would call
the yielding stage. Look at verse 15. Then, and isn’t
that a sad word to have here? He’s talking about, it’s inevitable. The horse is out of the barn. The desire for God’s grace and
for the way out, the escape, is well now gone. Then when lust
is conceived, it gives birth to sin. In other words, and it uses beautiful
language, the language of conception, the language of pregnant. Lust is conceived, there’s a
baby. And this baby is none other than
a bad, sinful, evil deed. And it’s being carried by a parent. And so the will has surrendered. There’s a resolve to gratify
this desire, whatever it is, to steal, to commit some moral
act, to do something, some act of revenge, It’s already in the
person’s heart. It’s already in process. He knows that it’s wrong. She
knows that she shouldn’t do this. But it’s already in motion. One Puritan said, when the evil
desire is admitted to the mind, instead of being resisted, preyed
against, driven out, it is retained, fostered, indulged, There is
a dwelling on the object. It grows in strength. It comes
forth in action in practical transgression. There is a departure
from the way of God’s commandments. Sin did not begin with the act.
It finished in the act. Stage three. The third stage. Not only the stage of savoring
and acting, but the third stage is dying. The third stage is
death. God takes sin very seriously,
doesn’t He? Look at verse 15. Then when lust
is conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is accomplished,
it brings forth death. It has become full grown. The
King James has it here finished. The act is finished. When the
act is finished, the wages come due, and the wages of sin is
death, God says. Even as we reviewed those four
effects of the fall, we know that they’re woven in, inherently
sinful, temporally vexed, physically dying, spiritually dead. Sin
brings death. Romans 5.21, sin reigned in death. That was our former life. The outcomes of those sinful
habits that we engaged in, Romans 6, 21, was death itself. And
so as one faithful brother said, the working of sin does not end
with angry speech. The lie, the act of dishonesty,
some sensual indulgence, it hardens, it darkens, it debases the nature,
it renders the heart Opener than ever before to all evil influences
in other words. He says it’s not going to stop
it now just one sin or one pattern of sin and Unless divine mercy
intervenes certainly at last its result is death In some cases it’s For the believer,
it’s it can be physical death. We know that from the passage
in first Corinthians 11 That’s why we examine our hearts. Some
sick and many sleep. We know that the wage of sin
is death for the natural man, that if the natural man does
not repent of his sin, he will surely die. As I said, God takes sin very
seriously. Samuel Smiles wrote a short little
sentence on this whole progression. He said, so a thought reap an
act, so an act reap a habit, so a habit reap a character,
so a character reap a destiny. And as James exposes the origin
of sin, he’s corrected the error, he’s explained the truth, but
his third and final statement to the saints to whom he was
writing was an admonition to alertness. We find it in verse
16. It’s a pivot verse. I explained
this in our training time last Lord’s Day. It’s a pivot verse
that belongs not only to verses 13 through 15, but it also introduces
us, it leads into verse 17. Look at verse 17. Verse 17 says, Every good thing
bestowed and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from
the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting
shadow. How could you possibly blame
your sin on God? God gives every good gift, superlatively
good gifts, only good gifts. You are utterly deceived if you
blame your sin on God. It’s the very word from which
we get our English word planet. Do not be deceived. Don’t be
led astray. Don’t be a wandering star blaming your sin on God. God is a pure and loving God. God has no part of our sin. One pastor said, where the blasphemy
that God is the author of sin is thoroughly entertained by
the mind, the man cannot be a Christian. If a right estimate of the fullness
of man’s moral responsibility is lacking, there can be no apprehension
of the nature and evil of sin. In other words, as long as you’re
willing to put this off on God, you’re never going to really
understand the battle. You’re not going to understand
the nature of sin. You’re not going to understand
the divine character, he says, or the nature of the Savior’s
work. Your sin was so bad that God
had to pay for it with the life of His own Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ. The whole structure of the Christian
faith, he says, and hope and holiness is undermined if we
foolishly blame God for our sin. Let’s repent before him, shall
we? Lord, we know that this is a
tendency into which we have fallen. Even if it’s just passing thoughts
in our minds Or we wondered why we were so tempted in some particular
area, or why certain people were around us, or difficult circumstances
presented themselves to us. Lord, we know for sure, with
absolute certainty here hearing James, our sin is never your
fault. We ask your forgiveness to whatever
degree we ever suggested it was. Lord God, we thank you and praise
you for this passage. We thank you for James taking
the time to lay out to us this ugly baby, the origin of sin. Lord God, give us a mind to see
what James was warning us about. Give us eyes to see. And if there
are any who do not know the Lord Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ is the only way to see the payment for sin,
God’s viewpoint of sin. We pray that you would do your work
in every heart. It’s in Jesus’ name that we pray. Amen.