We are honored to be with you for another lesson from James. Our study is in chapter 5, and we are coming to the end of this short, powerful book. We have two more lessons in our study, and just like the rest of James, these lessons are very practical regarding topics we always deal with.
Today, we will be thinking about encouragement and discouragement. This is a struggle we are familiar with. Life is difficult. We face many challenges, some from the outside and some from within. What should we do when we are discouraged? Where can we find more strength? How can we get out of bed to face another day? These are hard questions we struggle through when life is difficult.
Today’s title is “Lift Up Your Head,” and J Mark will give us three reasons to be encouraged. Let’s go with him to James 5 now.
Discouragement is not something we like to talk about or experience. But we all face it. There seem to be an infinite number of things that can go wrong.
In our previous episode, we observed how the wicked oppress the poor, exploiting them for their gain. In the first five verses of the chapter, we looked at the warnings God gave to the wealthy. They forgot that a day of reckoning was coming.
In our text, God speaks to the oppressed. You and I both know that when things aren’t going our way, it’s easy to become discouraged. Our vision seems to narrow to the point where all we can see is the end of our nose. We forget that life is more than our present circumstances.
James had a message for the discouraged—and it’s a message for us, too. That message forms the basis for the title of today’s study, “Lift Up Your Heads,” from James 5:7-12.
7 Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits patiently for the earth’s precious fruit until it receives the early and later rain.
8 You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.
9 Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold, the Judge is standing at the door!
10 My brethren, take the prophets, who spoke in the name of the Lord, as an example of suffering and patience.
11 Indeed, we count them blessed who endure. You have heard of Job’s perseverance and seen the end intended by the Lord—that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.
12 But above all, my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath. But let your “Yes” be “Yes,” and your “No,” “No,” lest you fall into judgment.
James provides three WORDS of encouragement that will help lift up our heads.
The First WORD of Encouragement is,
Don’t Lose Heart
Scripture uses the heart as the part of our being where we desire, deliberate, and decide. It is the comprehensive term for a person’s feelings, desires, passions, thoughts, understanding, and will, and the center of a person. The place to which God turns.
In verse six, James discusses how the wealthy oppressed the poor. The rich dragged the poor into court and their worthy name through the mud. People experiencing poverty had no one to plead their cause. They were unjustly condemned. No wonder they were discouraged!
But his word of encouragement moves past the circumstances to the core of their being: be patient. Don’t lose heart even after all the pain, heartache, and injustice you’ve experienced. Because “…your cries have entered the ears of the Lord of hosts.” He is coming in person to bring relief and vindicate your good name. Oh, what a word of encouragement!
To illustrate, James paints a picture that they can clearly understand. They understood the cycle of the growing season. They knew there was a long time between sowing and reaping. They knew the back-breaking work with each part of the process. And they knew the tedium of waiting helplessly on nature to do its part.
James then makes an interesting comparison. The eastern farmer waited for the early rain in the autumn to water the newly planted seeds. Wheat and barley were winter crops. The growing season followed, and as the crop matured, as the heads of grain filled out, spring rains were just before harvest. These rains were a part of God’s promise to Israel, as stated in Deuteronomy 11:14.
James ties the early and later rains to the coming of the Lord. He tells those oppressed: Just like the farmer waits patiently for the rains, you must wait patiently because the Lord’s coming is near. The apostles understood that the day of Pentecost was the “early rain.” God had poured out His Spirit on the newly planted seeds of the Gospel message.
Now, James was exhorting his readers to be patient and wait for the latter rain, that outpouring that the prophet Joel and the other prophets spoke about. Are we in that time of the latter rain today? God’s Spirit is moving in unprecedented ways, not so much in the Western world but in other parts of the world.
Along with these events taking place in other parts of the world, we see a growing spiritual coldness in the lives of many professing Christians in the West. Jesus told us it would be this way. People are “losing heart.” Those who were faithful for many years are now letting go of the truth and following “cunningly devised fables.” They have grown weary of the battle against Satan, sin, and self and are surrendering to fatigue. But James exhorts, “Don’t lose heart,” keep the faith. Harvest time is coming, and then you will be rewarded.
The Second WORD of Encouragement is,
Don’t Lose Hope
In verses nine through eleven of our text, James encourages his readers to “Don’t lose hope.” Hope is an essential part of life; the absence of hope is despair. People who succumb to despair see no point in living. Death seems like the only option to relieve their misery.
James says, “Do not groan or grumble against each other, brothers, lest you come into judgment of your own.” Isn’t it true that we often look for someone to blame when the pressure’s on and we see no way out? James warns those suffering injustice at the hands of the wealthy not to respond in kind to those who oppressed them or to their fellow sufferers. Responding that way would indicate that they had lost hope of future liberation. Remember, James said, the judge is standing at the door. In other words, he’s just about ready to come and set things right.
It’s human nature to think there’s no way out when we encounter difficult circumstances. Read the Psalms, and you’ll see how David and the other writers expressed this sense of hopelessness. God seems unreachable, and my troubles are about to bring me to ruin. We must remember God’s past dealings with us and others in those times.
Suppose you were given an urgent message for a particular group of people, a message of life and death. The one who sent you the message stressed its importance. Then, just before you delivered the message, you were told, “Give the message, but the people will not receive it; they won’t listen to you.” James reminds his readers of Isaiah and Jeremiah. At the beginning of their ministry, they were told that the people would not hear the message they had to deliver.
Yet, James said, imitate the example of the prophets. Even though they started with the warning that few would listen to them, they didn’t lose hope.
Those whose hope enables them to endure until the end are considered fortunate. Here, he introduces the ultimate biblical illustration of endurance: the righteous man, Job. If ever anyone seemed to be unjustly treated, it was this man. By the confession of God Almighty, here was a man morally blameless and upright. Everything Job had was taken away: possessions, family, health, and more. His wife, the one who should’ve supported him, said, “Curse God and die.”
Yet, Job did not give up. He said, “O that you would hide me in the grave, keep me secret until your wrath is past, appoint me a set time, and remember me! If a man dies, shall he live again? All the days of my appointed time will I wait till my change comes. You shall call, and I will answer you: you will have a desire to the work of your hands.” Job had hope because the judge was eventually going to come for him.
I don’t want you to miss something else in this verse. James says, “We have seen the end of the Lord: that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.” What did he mean by the “end of the Lord?” The word means the goal or the purpose God has in mind. It is not the termination point, as we often use the word end. God’s goal in all that Job suffered was to bring Job closer to Himself and to increase His wealth spiritually and materially.
Satan, the other major player in this cosmic theater, had opposite designs. He wanted to drive Job to despair, to bring him to financial, physical, and spiritual ruin, to the point where he would blaspheme God. But Job had hope. Even in the darkest moments of his suffering, when he despaired of life itself, he still had hope in God to the point that he could say, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him…”
James reminds us that, in our suffering, God’s goal is to bless us in ways we cannot see at present. But we must not lose hope to experience those blessings!
The Final WORD of Encouragement is,
Don’t Lose Honor
As we look at this last verse of our text, you may wonder where I see the concept of honor. James warns his readers about the danger of using an oath to establish the reliability of their word. And then he says, “…lest you fall into condemnation.” At first glance, we might think this means we will fall into judgment. But that’s not what this word conveys. It literally means the acting of a stage player or one who pretends to be something he is not. In our common English usage, we call someone like this a hypocrite. And that is the meaning here.
Hypocrisy is the antithesis of honor. A hypocrite cannot be trusted; he cannot be taken at his word; an honorable man can. One is never really sure about the motives of a hypocrite.
The Jews took a wide range of oaths, and depending on which one they used, it indicated how likely they were to keep their word. Their oaths were like our childish actions when we made a promise to someone but had our fingers crossed behind our backs.
When the pressure is unrelenting, we tend to vent our frustration to others. James strongly warns against this. He begins verse twelve by saying, “Above all things…” The priority is not to use an oath to prove your sincerity, or you may fall into hypocrisy. You will lose your integrity and your honor.
As a Christ-follower, you will always be among the “lower class” in the eyes of the world. Jesus said that’s the way it would be. But don’t be discouraged. Don’t lose heart, don’t lose hope, and above all, don’t lose your honor. Lift up your head; be patient; the coming of the Lord is drawing near.
Thank you, J Mark, for sharing these three ways to stay encouraged. This is good, and we want to apply it to ourselves, but we also want to help others stay encouraged. Lord willing, you will not only apply this lesson to yourself but if you see someone who is discouraged, share these reasons with them. Just like Aaron and Hur supported Moses, may we lift up the arms of tired brothers and sisters. Together with other followers of Christ, we can encourage and be encouraged.
It was good to be with you for this study. Please let us know if you have any questions about this teaching or want to hear other teachings from Heralds of Hope. Our email is hope@heraldsofhope.org. You can also contact us via our website, heraldsofhope.org. And of course, you can write to us. Our address is Hope for Today, Box 3 Breezewood, PA 15533.
Thanks so much for joining us today. We look forward to being with you next week for the last lesson from the book of James. Here is the encouraging verse from Exodus I just referred to: “When Moses’ hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat on it. Aaron and Hur held his hands up so that his hands remained steady till sunset.” Be encouraged, and go, encourage someone.
*This episode is an exposition by J. Otis Yoder, re-recorded by J. Mark Horst, with an opening and closing by Arlin Horst.
