A Praying, Healing and Restoring Community

You are listening to a message from Thrive Community Church, a church located in Southwest Florida. For more info, visit us at thrive-fl.org. Well, good morning. Okay. Hey, it's great to be here today with you and starting this new sermon series, How Grace Changes Everything, as we look at the book of James. Now, this book is a whole 108 verses. It's actually pretty short. It's almost the length of a sermon, honestly. It probably could have been a sermon. And of the 108 verses, 50 of them in this book of James have commands in them. So it's very blunt, very pithy, very to the point. Now, James, from what we know, is the half-brother of Jesus who wrote this book. And can you imagine being in Jesus' family growing up? You know, he's the goody-two-shoes, the perfect kid who would drive me nuts. My brother and sister drove me nuts anyways. But, I mean, can you imagine? He never does anything wrong, and it's just, and he thinks he's the son of God. Well, if you don't know, in the Gospels, James, well, it says Mary and Jesus' brothers and sisters. So we think James with them came during Jesus' public ministry. When he started his ministry, they came to get him because they thought he was crazy. Okay? I mean, seriously. It would be pretty hard to believe that this guy in the flesh, that you've been around, and you've seen him eat, and you've seen him sleep, and you've seen him in all these things. I don't care how perfect he seemed, that he could be the son of God, the Messiah. It wasn't until after the resurrection, from what we can tell, and then it all kind of clicked, and James fell into place, and now this whole book is based on the teaching of Jesus, more on the Sermon on the Mount, what Jesus taught, than any other New Testament letter. And it's really based on the foundation of grace. Grace changes everything. Now, you might be wondering why we've got all these frames up here decorating the stage. It's kind of a metaphor for what we see throughout this whole thing, that it's the framework of grace that lets us really put in perspective all the things that happen in our lives. It's not so much what you see, but how you see it. Right? Two people can see the same thing, and they think differently about it. And it's how they see it that makes the difference. And some people can in fact see, I mean, we all see the same world. Some people look at the world and see just randomness and chaos. I understand that these days. But also some people look at the world and see God's hand in it. So which is it? And it's your perspective, your framework, and we believe the framework for this book, the framework for our lives, is grace. How grace changes everything. And the book of James is kind of a litmus test, you might say. It kind of shows where people are at and what their framework is because with 50 commands, 108 verses, this pithy book, do this, don't do this, try this, don't do this, consider this, stop this, watch out. It's easy to think and turn the framework into just a bunch of rules. And the framework into just keep the rules and God likes you. And what Sam said before is so true. I don't care what you try to do. That's not going to work. All our righteous acts, whatever they are, I don't care what they are, are kind of like, you know, it's just not going to be there. We don't get brownie points with God. Okay. You've probably heard that before. Rather, I think the right framework on the book of James shows that what James is doing is describing what the Christian life following Jesus looks like, how grace has changed everything. It changes our approach to our use of time, our planning, how we handle stress, trials, tribulations in life, how we look at conflict, how we handle our own desires that work inside of us, how we speak, how we address each other, all of those things. He deals very practical, everyday, everyday stuff in this book. And it's all through the framework of grace. Okay. So before we begin, let's pray. Lord God, your grace has changed everything in our lives. Your grace, your love, your mercy, your resurrection, your death, the whole thing. Everything you did, Lord, as it changed James and turned him from someone who just couldn't believe into one who did and then lived that belief. Lord, we pray it does for us today, too. So open us, Holy Spirit. Be present in every word in this scripture. We thank you, Lord, for the whole Christian church here in this area, for all the churches and their different expressions that are sharing the gospel today. Be with those messages and create a movement here of your spirit that this area gives you glory. And our lives start reflecting what this book talks about, of how we love one another, care for one another, speak to one another, how we plan our time, everything, Lord, how it can change everything. So change us today. All this we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. So let's get into the text itself, James 1, verses 1 through 18. It's a little long today, but I th...