The Wonder of Faith and Works, Part Two, James 2:14-16

1. Read James 2:14-26. Why are faith and works inseparable according to James? Can you think of a time in your life when your faith has inspired your actions or when your actions have demonstrated your faith?
2. How do the stories of Abraham and Rahab illustrate the relationship between faith and works? Can you identify someone in your life who has demonstrated faith through their actions? What can you learn from their example?
3. How does the connection between faith and works affect our relationship with God? In other words, what areas in your life can you trust God more and rely on your faith to guide you in taking action?
4. If faith produces works, how can we discern if our actions are driven by true faith?
5. Assess your life. Where would you say you are right now? Have you relied on a past experience to justify your current actions? Are you working hard to earn approval without having a relationship? Or are you in a really good place in a relationship with God where the works are starting to more naturally flow?

Practice: Reflect on your faith. Take time each day this week to reflect on your faith in God and His promises. Consider how your faith impacts your relationship with Him and shapes your worldview. Then pray for opportunities. Ask God to reveal opportunities for you to live out your faith through meaningful actions. Pray for wisdom, guidance, and boldness to step out in obedience when you encounter these opportunities. Then take intentional action. When you identify opportunities for good works, take intentional action to make a positive impact. This could involve acts of kindness, acts of generosity, acts of forgiveness, or acts of speaking truth in love.

Good morning. We are back in our series in James, and we're really at the heart of the book. And it takes a couple of passes through this text, because it's the most theological text in James, and. And it's really a central point for everything James has said already and is going to show us about what it means, about how faith works, how genuine faith works. So don't be intimidated if you're not very familiar with all the theological jargon that goes into this, because James is very, very.

He's not hard to understand here. It just gets something you gotta really think about when you try to connect it to all that the scripture teaches, and a lot of what many of us have grown up learning, and we have to overcome some of the things and expand our theology. When you read scripture, you know, one of the challenges is saying, what is James saying and how does it relate to what Paul is saying and how do you put them together? So that's all that is happening here. James is bringing faith and works together in the absolute tightest way that you can that I've seen in scripture.

And we tend to hold them a little more loosely, distinguish them a little bit more. And James is picturing the whole christian life as a relationship between faith and works. And the simple argument is that they're absolutely inseparable. They're inseparable. They're distinguishable.

You talk about either one, but neither can exist without the other.

So look at what he says. I mean, I think we'll go to the very last verse of the text we're going to look at, and you'll see what he means. It's hard to get any clearer than this. First, the body apart from the spirit is dead. So also, faith apart from works is dead.

So you can talk about a body, you can talk about the spirit that inhabits that body separately if you want to, but it has no life unless you put them together. That's what James is saying. I don't think it gets any stronger than that.

So there's just. They're just inseparable. And if you try to divide them, which happens sometimes in our language and in our thinking, when we think about our lives, we divide those. James will say, well, someone might say, well, I have faith. And someone else might say, well, I have works.

So you divide them up as if you just need one or the other. And James will say, no, that's not correct. That leads to problems. Show me your faith apart from your works. It's very difficult to do because faith is invisible.

I'll show you my faith by my works. So they absolutely go together.

James will say, faith alone, by itself, without works, he's already said, is demonic. It's not any better than demonic faith because it would amount to, without anything coming of the faith that a person believes when they come to God, put their trust in Christ, it would just amount to something, some truth that you assented to. You just said, yeah, I see that, I buy it. But if nothing comes of that, something's definitely wrong. Somebody recently shared with me that they have a family member who asked them, what's the least amount I have to do to be a Christian?

Okay, so that's one problem on this side. You just think to yourself, what's the least amount I have to do? James said, that's not even the now, that's not an uncommon thought for a person who hasn't given their life to Christ yet and doesn't know the kind of change that occurs. But that mentality is not going to work. That's not any better than demonic faith.

But works don't produce faith. Like if you don't have faith, but you do have works, now it's all about you and what you do, and that's impossible, too. James gonna say that's never gonna work because works can't create genuine faith either. Does that make sense? You don't work backwards.

Say, I'll do stuff and then that will create faith. No, they got to go together. It's body and spirit. Now, remember what we dealt with a couple of weeks ago. I'm only going to hit it for a second, just so that, just by way of review, but you remember part of the controversy, you will, is Romans, which is what Paul says, a person is justified by faith and not by works.

James comes along and says, a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. So James puts them together and we said they are standing back to back defending two potential, two errors of salvation. One's on the front end, how you get in, and the other part is what happens once you're in. And so we got two different vantage points here. And it might be helpful if this is by way of real quick just, I mean, summary.

So if you weren't here last week, I'm just hurrying to what I really want to talk about today, just to give you a quick. So this is a picture of it. So when you come to faith in Christ, works have nothing to do with it. Once you enter into this, and it's not just a point of salvation, it's a whole package of salvation. So once you come into that salvation by faith, it's not by anything you do, it's by what Jesus did.

That's what James or Paul means by justify. It means you were declared righteous when you didn't have any righteousness. So that's how you get in. But once you get in, work's become a natural part of that life, that new life. In fact, I was thinking through this picture today, actually, it would look better.

This chart would feel more real. What Paul is or what James is saying. If this wasn't even here, you didn't even see works. Because there's no works at all involved in the front end. So let's just take the word out, imagine, and then rather than seeing works out here.

This is the problem with the picture. Actually works. Should almost go like this.

Because it's not something that you wonder if it's going to happen. You hope it's going to happen. We'll see what happens.

They come together and work together, and there's no separating them once that happens. So that's probably a better picture now.

So, I mean, there's a whole lot more to that, but that's pretty much the review. Now we're going to talk about, really, the last half of this passage. And we're talking about the wonder of faith in works. And don't miss this. It's a wonder that you get to be saved without having to do anything for it.

Don't you understand? That's a wonder. Because then you have to sit around going, am I better than that guy? How much do I have to do? We're all equal.

We all come to this point with the same amount of righteousness. None. That is a wonder. Listen, you're not going to find that in any religion in the world, except right here.

And then it's just as big a wonder that you take a guy or you take a gal and you move him into a relationship with Christ, and he'll start doing things and being things, thinking things he could never have imagined. That's as big a wonder. And James is going to show us what that looks like. So if you're still not convinced, James will basically say, all right, Demi. That's what the word means.

James is. I will say, james is a little hostile. I don't know what God. I don't know how James grew. I mean, he had Jesus in his house.

He probably Jesus bugged him, I'm sure as much as you could possibly be bugged by a brother. But James can be a little tart. And he just basically says, yo, you still. Oh, you still need me to show you, dummy, that faith apart from works is useless? Okay, that's what I'll do.

And this is really great, because this word, let's see. Faith apart from works doesn't work. That's my favorite part. These are the same words.

Works and useless. In other words, James is saying, workless.

Faith apart from works doesn't work. It's the same words. I mean, he is not letting up on this at all. It's non working.

It's unworkable. Don't even go there. So you need proof of that. Okay, I'm going to give them to you. Let's talk about Abraham.

He's going to give us two illustrations. He's going to give us Abraham, and then he's going to give us Rahab. For. And what this is about to do is just a beautiful.

I just love it. So you mind if we just pray right now? I just would like to pray because there's a lot here, and I'm confused sometimes in my own head. Father, please bring clarity. Help us to understand this beautiful text.

In Jesus name, amen. All right, so we have two illustrations. You got Abraham and you have Rahab. Let me tell you why that's important, because you're going to see the wonder of how faith and works work together. Abraham's a patriarch.

He's the father. You see it. He's the father of faith. Everyone who comes to faith is connected to Abraham. He is the patriarch.

He's a male, single most important figure in jewish history. You bring up Abraham, and there's a solemn sacredness comes in the room. God spoke to him directly, showed right up at his door.

Then you have Rahab. Prostitute. Complete other end of the spectrum. Patriarch and a prostitute. She's not just a prostitute.

She's a female. She's a Pornay is the word they use for her. Porn. Patriarch. And then you got a gentile woman who's a pagan, a canaanite, the archenemy of Israel.

Her gender was different. Heritage, spiritual heritage was different, race different from a different place.

God didn't show up and tell her anything. God didn't show up and say a word to her. She heard it indirectly. She got news. Nobody personally told her anything.

That's the two different places they're coming from. And, James, you're going to show the wonder of faith in works. No matter what kind of person you are, it works the same. And so you have this spectrum, and this is part of the wonder, everybody starts at the same place. It doesn't matter if you're a patriarch or if you're a prostitute.

Everybody starts at the same place. Everybody's on equal footing. That's why partiality makes no sense in Christianity. It makes no sense.

We all come to the same place. The gospel is the great equalizer.

You're going to see there are people on this spectrum that, the spiritual spectrum, that wonder about themselves. You know, Abraham is the guy that grew up in the christian home, and he's heard it all his life. Then the prostitute's a guy that was in jail. He's been on drugs. He was addicted, strung out or whatever.

He just went off the rails at some point morally. And when you get these people in the same room, you could tell their stories, what happens with their stories. So James is going to talk to you about how your faith story works with faith, because this person, just as I believed it all my life, this person says, well, God came into my heart, and I feel like I'm an outsider, and you are somewhere on that in your mind. And I'm going to show you how. I'm going to tease it out a little bit, but give you an illustration.

A lot of times my wife will come home because she meets with a lot of people and she'll say, hey, I shared your story today. I said, hey, that's my story. I said, what do you mean, you shared my story? Yeah, I told her your story. I said, did you tell her yours?

No, I didn't tell her mine. Mine's not as good as yours, that kind of thinking. Have you ever thought that my story's not as good as her story? And sometimes you don't know what to do with your story on either end of that. So your story is every bit as phenomenal as anybody's story.

And not only does everybody need it, and we start at the same place, but everybody can be transformed. The self righteous, you know, grow up listening to it all their lives. Always a pretty decent person. Guy. He can.

He's got a lot of changing and transforming to do. The one over here on the moral edge and the end of just the pit, that person's got a lot of transforming to do. And you can imagine the pace at which those two people might grow, countless ways and speeds at which either one of them begin to grow in their faith. James is not interested in any of that. James is just going to say, just watch how God works in both their lives.

So just the wonder of that. So now look at Abraham. Abraham was not Abraham, our father, justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac? Now he's going to take us to a spot in Genesis to talk about Abraham. So I want to talk about this because this is your sort of your faith line, no matter when you come to faith.

So anytime, like when Paul or even James is going to allude to Genesis 15 six is really the moment when Abraham's faith, God, told him exactly what the plan is really going to be, and he believed it. And it was accounted to him as righteousness. A guy who had no righteousness, his faith, because he trusted God. He got God's righteousness. That's that first part where the faith comes in right here.

But James doesn't come to this point in the story yet. He will allude to it in a second, but it's secondary to him. James points down. Here he goes, let me show you this story. Now, you and I might all.

We might definitely say, oh, no, you got to go all the way back to the beginning. James says, no, I don't have to go back to the beginning. I can drop down at any point in Abraham's life and show you how faith and works work together. I don't have to go all the way back to the beginning. And that's really good news for those of you like Abraham, who wouldn't even know when the beginning was if you grew up in a christian home and you have no idea when you gave your life to Christ, or you say, I've always believed James is going to say, I don't need clarity on this end.

I'll just look at your life right now, today. Just show me your life today. We had a gal in our partnership class. Sweet.

And we started to tell our stories. And she was just kind of like this. Grew up in a christian home, and just people were telling their stories, and they had these clear moments, you know, and she couldn't find one. And she's confused and struggling with that. And there's angst in the story because she's not sure when or if.

And then she had a time in her life where she went off track for a while and then came back, and there's confusion back this way. And so all I did was say, what do you believe today? Believe Jesus Christ died and rose again as your lord and savior? Absolutely. You living for him today?

Absolutely. Don't worry about yesterday.

Don't worry about it. And James is going to come right down here and say, you know what? All I got to do is look at your life today. And he picks a point out in Abraham's life, really important point, but it could have been any point. There was other places that he could have come into Abraham's life to show that what happened here was real, that his faith experience was real, could have dropped down anywhere in his life.

Like, if James were talking to you today, could he drop down into your life right now and said, I don't care what happened three years ago. I don't care what happened three days ago. I want to know where you are right now, and you be good, or you got questions, doubting issues, you're not sure that the present becomes the critical moment. So this is when Abraham offered Isaac and God said, I want you to take your son up there, and I want you to sacrifice him. To me, this was everything to Abraham.

He said, what does faith look like? Well, it was a moment in Abraham's life when God asked him to do something that seems to go counter to everything God promised him, because everything was wrapped up in Isaac. And you're asking me to take his life. And basically, Hebrews teaches us that, basically, Abraham said, God, if you take him, I believe you'll raise him from the dead to do what you want with him. I can trust you to do with anything.

I can trust you, so I'll do whatever you ask me to do. That's where James focuses in.

So James is looking at his whole life, not just the beginning point. And so in Christianity, sometimes that's what we'll do. We'll just go back to the beginning. And what happens when you do that? You never want to go backwards in an effort to explain away why nothing in your life looks like, you know, or love God.

So if you're way down here in your walk with Christ, let's say, but you're not living for him at all. If somebody were to come up to you right now, and you'd never recognize God was the God of the universe and the Lord of my life, but somebody presses and you go, yeah, but there was a time way back when, when I put my faith in Christ. If you try to skip, if you're skipping over the middle piece to justify where you're at, James would say, eh, don't do that, because we can look at your life right now, and it tells the whole story, tells the whole story.

It's always more important where you are today.

So the middle matters. And I just love that James plops down right there in the middle of his life, and he could have gone to a couple of spots, but he just said, I'll show you. And all that this is showing is that this was real. So they're not disconnected. I can talk about.

They're distinguishable. I can talk about either one. But this tells the story of this.

That's just a beautiful way that James is putting this. So some people in life get a head start, you know? I didn't get a head start. Nobody told me about God. I didn't know anything about God.

The idea that God would have showed up in the house that I lived in and the family that I lived in was an absurd thought. We didn't talk about them. We didn't know anything about them. I didn't know what the Bible was. Nothing.

Then you got the guy or the gal that's grown up in it. Head start. They've known the books. They're not even believers yet, necessarily, but they know it all. They've been in church all their lives.

They got a head start.

And James is saying that person needs faith and works to work together just like everybody else does.

And then you got some people who have to play catch up. Wow. I didn't know any of that. He just showed up at my door. Now James is going to.

This is really. It's really spectacular how he does this. Now. Now what I want to do is show you, basically what James. James is going to give us three statements that help us understand how tightly related in Abraham's life, how this all worked, or let's say how this worked, why these two are so connected, and why I can drop down in anybody's life.

I don't have to come all the way back to the beginning. Now, here's what he's going to say. He's going to give us three reasons, and they are. They're just. You see?

You see, Faith was active along with his works, and Faith was completed by his works. Hillside. I don't know how to underscore the beauty of this verse right here. The theology wrapped up in it two things. You see, Faith was active.

It was actually working. That's the word. James just continually uses this word. Faith was working, works. So here's something you learn about faith.

You might not have even known it. You might. Faith works, and then works come out of it. And so it's more than cause and effect. You know, the cause and effect thought is, well, I'll give my life to Christ.

Sort of like the guy who says, well, I'll do what's the most. The least I can do. That's not how it works. Because when you come to faith in Christ. When you come to faith in Christ, faith starts working.

That's how come works come. Isn't that interesting? Faith is a working thing, and works come from it. It's more than cause and effect. So that you're wondering, well, we'll see if I have the faith of bring some works around.

James said, that's not how it works.

It's already working so beautifully.

So faith cooperates with works. It's working. And then works flow out of it. There's no easy line between faith working and works. It's not just cause and effect.

That idea leads you and me to sometimes to sometimes think, well, we can have our faith, but then, you know, maybe in our life, it's okay if our life doesn't, if it doesn't show up in our life. James says that's just not how faith works. So faith cooperates with works. Now, here's the second thing he says. Faith completes works.

This is even more remarkable.

And essentially works complete faith.

When you have the work, it completes faith. This is an interesting thought. This is the word for perfect, which James has been using all the way through this text, all the way through James, because you're becoming perfect. Let patients have a perfect work. You're becoming perfected.

Faith is perfecting you. And that just means that it's faith is gonna reach its ultimate goal of producing a different life in you. That's what he's trying to say there.

It will be brought to completion and works complete faith. So faith cooperates with works. Works complete faith. So a person comes to faith, and you're like, well, what's that faith for? In first John 412.

I think I have it up here.

Here's the only other time you get in a phrase like this, no one's ever seen God before. If we love one another, God abides in us, and his love is perfected in us. Now, you wouldn't say God's love is not perfect, but God's perfect love comes inside of you and it begins to, and it comes to completion. God's love reaches its ultimate goal as I become loving.

And that's the same thing that happens here in the faith picture. So that my faith, when it's accomplishing what is my, what it's supposed to works just naturally come out of it. They just achieve its goal. That's what James means by that. He's basically saying, there's no way your faith isn't going to produce works.

They're just too connected. Then one other thing that I just think is very, very interesting. Look what he says right here. Third thing, faith cooperates with works. Works completes faith.

Scripture was fulfilled. This is a very interesting phrase. We could talk about that a long time. What scripture was fulfilled that says, well, here it is. Abraham believed God.

Now he's going to quote Genesis 15 six. Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. That's the text we're used to hearing. That's this. That's this one.

Now James is going to come back to that one. Genesis 15 is, look, scripture was fulfilled. This is so beautiful because he's basically saying this was. It's not quite this, but it sounds like it. This was a prophecy that James got righteousness and it came to fruition when he obeyed God.

Scripture was fulfilled. This one was actually fulfilled when Abraham did this. That's how connected that they are. The faith produces works. That is.

I'm trying to think of another dynamic that explicit within the same life, that you get this fulfillment language of scripture in one person or story, and I just can't do it. It's just overwhelming. How do we know? James was basically saying, how do we know this was real? How do you know?

I'll take you to Genesis 22 and show you. Abraham did exactly what God asked him to do. That's how you know. So that's all that.

All those texts come together in this beautiful, beautiful way.

So that's why James sums up in verse 24, you see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. I hope you can see that, he says, I hope you can see how they go together.

And this is important.

James doesn't prefer works over faith because it's really easy. James is so practical. You think all James cares about is what you do.

All James cares about is what you do. So just get your little busy body self working.

That's not what James says. He's practical. He's not a pragmatist. What you say, all that matters is what you do. No, James is saying what you do connects to your heart and your faith.

And they're so closely connected, the one doesn't take precedence over the other.

It just tends to get lopsided. And the pendulum just swings one way or this. Just faith. Only just faith. Just believe.

And then James seems to swing that pendulum onto the other side. Well, no, it's not about that. It's about you just get busy, big boy, and then you and I feel guilty every day because we're not everything we should be. That's not it either.

So he doesn't prefer works to faith. He's just saying you can't separate them.

All right, now, let's look at one more person. Let's illustrate this one more way.

In the same way, was not also rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out? By another way, you know the story. You can go to Joshua, chapter two, two through six, and you'll hear the story a little bit. Now, what we have here, something really remarkable, and then I'm gonna apply all this for you in just a second. So I just need you to hang with me.

But what you have is a spiritually deprived person. What would you say to a woman who grew up, was a prostitute, grew up in Canaan? Israel's enemies. God's wiping Canaanites out.

Not only was she deprived of anything spiritual in her life, nobody told her about God. She was a depraved woman, low morality, pagan, gentile, obscure. Does anybody even know?

And some of you might feel that way. You might feel a little bit like, yeah, you're behind. You came to faith, and you're not sure. She didn't experience anything from God personally. She just heard stories.

And what happens is, when Joshua sends the spies to spy out the land of Jericho, somehow or another, they end up at her house to hide. Or the inn, it could have been an inn because she was overseeing. Who knows? She was a madam. Possibly not positive, but they show up at her house, and I want you to listen to this woman and what she says.

Can you imagine God just shows up at your door? In a strange way, here's what she says to these men when they get to her house. You got to love this.

She had hit him on the roof, and she said to them, listen, I know this is how it would have sounded to me. I know that the Lord has given. I know the Lord has given you the land. I know you're here to take it.

Well. I want you to know everybody around here is afraid. Everybody's hearts, even the warriors. Their hearts are melting. For we heard how the Lord dried up the water in the Red Sea before you came out of Egypt.

She didn't get any direct information. She's hearing tales.

And we know what you did to those two kings over there. I love that line. And as soon as we heard it, as soon as we heard it, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th. And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted. My heart melted when I heard that, something rang true.

And then it says, you don't know when that happened. So if you look at Abraham's. We got a lot of clarity here, I think.

Let's start over. You look at Abraham's life, right? You got Genesis 15, six here and 22 here. And you go, Abraham can go back to a specific moment, and Abraham or James even takes him back to that moment. Good for you, Abe.

Well, what about Rahab? She just says, at some point, we heard the tale of how great your God was, and we had faith. I can't even pinpoint a day when it happened. Isn't that great? All I know is my heart melted.

That's all I know. I can't tell you when it happened, but all of a sudden, you guys are at my door. For God, for that faith to activate, for that faith to now have to do something. And this is the moment, because she's got to protect these spies from the king. God just shows up at her door, and it's so beautiful.

And you say, well, isn't Abraham more important than Rahab?

I mean, this is a woman who. I don't know how old she is when she comes to faith. And I don't know if she'll ever outlive her reputation as a prostitute. I don't know if she'll get enough years.

You know, you just don't know if that's going to happen.

But I want to show you something.

This is Matthew's genealogy of Jesus. He traces it all the way back to big, big daddy Abraham.

Look who else is in that lineage. Rahab? Abraham. Any better? She's in the same family line.

Do you know that? She's going to give birth to a son by the name of Boaz, and this guy is going to marry Ruth.

They're going to have a son, and it's going to be Jesse, and that's going to be David's father, and that's going to take you and connect you all the way down to Jesus. She's in the family line. You got to include her in the tree.

What's she doing in there?

Everybody comes to faith the same way, and everybody grows the same way. It doesn't matter what the rest of that. So remarkable. Oz Guinness wrote this. Christ is the only way to God.

But there are as many ways to Christ as there are people.

That is the absolute truth. So anyone can become what God wants.

So let's just apply this for a few minutes. I think that's the important part here. You say, well, let's talk about your life now. Let's get down in the nitty gritty of your present day life. Let's forget anything that happened in the past.

Where are you today?

You say, well, you know, I could probably do better if I. You know, my circumstances aren't great. You know, it's really hard to live for God in my family. It's really hard to live for God at the job that I have. I don't have any real christians around me.

I've heard all this.

My job puts me in tough spots. I mean, are you in Rahab spot, you know, where your whole life's on the line? Both Abraham and Rahab risk their lives on faith. Yeah, they're going to lose a lot and potentially could lose a lot. But I know a lot of people who will say, yeah, my circumstances don't allow faith to be activated to produce a work.

Yeah, you just don't know my history, Jameson. I don't care about your history. Faith works, works.

That's what he said. So I'm just going to use my life as an illustration for a second, and I'll try to bring it to you guys, too. So here I am, more on the Rahab side, only because I didn't really know a whole lot about faith, and I didn't have any moral compass in my life, even as a, you know, a young person or teen. But when I first come, came to Christ, little shifts immediately started happening. I was a high school kid who was a decent kid, but my language wasn't good.

I mean, nobody around me spoke with pure language. I was doing a lot of little things that started to shift. I started to want to wake up for church on a Sunday morning. Teenager.

And we had to drive really far for church because it was a great church in Keyphis Caine, Florida. And I just. We loved to go, but it was almost an all day affair, but we loved it. And lots of little shifts started to happen. But then this is what happens.

This happens to all of us. And you might be in the middle of one of these. There comes a time. This is what one writer said. I just think it's perfect at times.

A vortex of the dire decisions of life, where hopes, dreams, ambitions and destinies. Life itself is on the line, like a rahab moment. If I hide these guys, I could be killed for that. Abraham. If I.

I'm gonna lose my son.

It's like little shifts, little shifts, little shifts. And then all of a sudden, you're faced with something big. That's what happens to both of these guys. It's like he says, vortex of all. My destiny seems to be on the line.

And this you say, well, what does faith look like in this moment? Faith puts your future in God's hands. I don't know how this is going to turn out. I don't know what's going to happen if I end up having to kill Isaac. I don't know what's going to happen if they find me after I've tried to rescue these folks.

If I'm hiding them, I don't know what they're going to do. But basically, Abraham would say, I'll trust God for the outcome. That's what your faith does. And you'll have moments in your life where you feel like you're at a crossroad. And it is really, really difficult for me.

When I first gave my life to Christ, I had to tell my mom that I'm not going to move back in with her, the woman who was my everything. And I knew I was going to break her heart.

Moved in with my dad for a summer. At 14 years old, my dad asked me to stay with him and go to a christian school that was right around the corner. It was the best decision, one of the best decisions of my whole life. But I had to call mom and say, I'm staying with dad. Still can't believe at 14, I had to do that.

But it literally was hopes, dreams, and destinies on the line in that moment. And I was only a believer for a month, maybe.

And then, you know, I had gotten a part of this optimist football team because I hadn't gotten into the high school yet. I wanted to play, for sure. And so now I meet all these kids in Palm Springs north, and none of them are believers, but they're all cool as heck guys and gals, and we're hanging out, and I'm just learning the faith. And now I have to be careful how I hang with friends. And I start dating this one girl, she's a little bit older than me, and she wants to have sex.

And I'm talking to my dad. How does this work? Oh, son, that's not going to work. I remember riding my bike over to her house and saying, I'm sorry, this is not going to work. I'm 14.

I don't even know what's at stake. I just know I'm not supposed to do that.

And I don't even know what would have happened if I had crossed that line. It wasn't heroic. I was just like, well, what am I supposed to do now? And is this what I'm supposed to do, then I'll do it. And you'll never have a girlfriend again.

You'll never have a pretty girl in your life again. You could be really scared at 15.

What am I going to do without you?

I survived, you know? And some of you are single, and you're having sex like it's not a big deal.

No boundaries, because let me tell you how faith works. This is how faith works. God said, don't do that. I'm gonna trust. He's right on that.

It doesn't make sense to me, but I'm gonna trust that he's right on that.

So I'm going to do it. And I don't know what it means. I might lose this person in my life. I don't know what's going to happen for the future. I don't know.

All I know is he said, don't cross that line. I'm not crossing that line. And you trust it. You say, how does faith work? It works like this.

God said, don't do that. I trust that he's right on this subject, and I might lose something really important, but I'll trust that he'll provide. That's what it looks like. Same with money, same with relationships. It's amazing how hard it is for us to let go of relationships that are killing us because we feel like we're just gonna be.

We're gonna be in the middle of nowhere, in some abyss without this person in our life. And God says, cut it off. I'll take care of you.

That's what trust is. It's, I trust God when he says it. Till Noah, build an ark, there's no rain, build a boat.

Abraham, leave. Leave your country, leave your town, leave your family, leave everybody and go. Where am I going? God not telling you yet. Just move.

All right, I'm moving. Then you just go right down the list. Got to let go of things. Got to say no to things. Got to give up things.

Got to say yes to things. That's how it works. Jeremiah. God says to Jeremiah, I want you to buy a field. Lord.

The Chaldeans are coming in and taking us over. The Babylonians are about to take over this whole place. That's a really poor investment, Lord. Yeah, buy it. I love this line.

It's beautiful. In Jeremiah 32, Jeremiah says, so I bought the land.

Didn't sound smart to me, but God said, do it. I bought the land. It's one of my favorite lines in Jeremiah. I bought the land. And you know what?

This, by the way, is what friends do. Faith is a friend relationship with God. I look out for his interest. He's looking out for mine. We're so connected.

Last thing I want to do is hurt him. We're tight. I mean, we walk this life together.

For your friends, you put things at risk. And James chapter four is going to say, you're either a friend of me or you're an enemy.

That's all friends do. And verse 26. To wrap this up a little bit, let's see. For as the body, apart from the spirit, is dead, so also faith, apart from works, is dead. And the only way to sum this up, basically, is nobody wants a faith like that around, just like you wouldn't want a corpse hanging around.

The Jews were petrified and so turned off by dead things, corpses, putrid, decaying, lifeless things, that it was unholy to them. It wanted nothing to do it. James says, that's what I. Faith that doesn't work is like.

So, I don't know. You might be at a turning point. You might be at one of those moments. Like, Rahab, you had your moment of faith in the past, and now you're at a turning point in your life, and you go, I don't know.

Right now, I got destiny's hopes and dreams on the line here, and I'm not sure what I'm gonna do. And James is saying right here, it might be, you need to give your life to Christ. And you haven't. You've been messing around with that, or you've been really toying, really, really leaning toward doing some things that you know clearly are not the right thing to do.