Condemnation of materialism
James 5:1-6C · Andrew Molloy · Sep 10, 2023
James, No. 34
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261932352271

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

So we're in James chapter 5, 1 through 6. I'm doing 6 through, after this, 6 through 11, I think that's right, for next week. 7 through 11 next week. But it starts out James 5, 1 through 6. Come now, you rich, weep and howl for upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments have become moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have rusted, and their rust will be a witness against you, and will consume your flesh like fire. It is in these last days that you have stored up your treasure. Behold, the pay of your laborers who mowed your fields, or harvested your fields, some texts say, and which has been withheld by you, cries out against you. And the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of Sabbath or Sabaoth.

You have lived luxuriously on the earth and led a life of wanton pleasure. You have fattened your hearts in the day of slaughter. You have condemned and put to death the righteous man. He does not resist you. So how's that? So what kind of day are you guys having? And so that's heavy stuff, huh? So let's just jump into it, James.

One through three, come now you rich and howl for your howl for your miseries are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments have become moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have rusted and their rust will be a witness against you and will consume your flesh like fire. We'll skip 3C for a minute here and just concentrate on the first part of the verse of 3 when we get to it.

But who is James addressing here at? So we need a poll of the class. Is it the ungodly or godly people? Godly. Godly? Sounds like ungodly, but... Godly or ungodly. I think he's godly. Okay, how about we switch? Oh, sorry? Could be both, yeah. It's where he's contrasted them to the righteous man, that they put to death the righteous man. Seems to imply that they are the I'm going to take that tack, Miles, and so I'm of the opinion that it's ungodly for the following reasons. So are they believers or unbelievers?

J. Vernon McGee, he quotes Calvin of all people, came to see that it's to the ungodly or the unbelievers. Support for this can be... Can miseries be directed to those in Christ? These miseries, right? Trials can. Trials can. Miseries? Yeah, yeah, see? Or would he ever tell someone in Christ that their heart has been fattened in the day of slaughter? That's a little heavy too, right? Harsh for a believer. Or will a believer be slaughtered for storing up and hoarding riches? That seems to me to be a judge of the Great White Throne judgment or, you know, something like that.

James begins his letter here to Jews who are scattered and they're experiencing various trials, right, in James 1.1, is it? Yeah. consider it all joy when you experience various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. So they are to endure in trials. And if they were rich, these believers that he was addressing, who have scattered, maybe up north or in Galatia, wouldn't their money be sort of buffer them from these trials? If you have a lot of money, you can you know, you're not going to get person, you're not, you're not working to the bone, like he talks in these passages. So the money would be like an insulator, I think, for it.

So that also kind of supports he's addressing someone else. So what I think it is, and you know, what McGee says, and I think even Macaulay says that it's And a brief address to the ungodly here, a brief monologue, let's say. It's almost like when I was in college, we had a class like this. So all these guys sitting, young men, young women, and this professor focused on you, Carolyn.

He didn't read the assignment, so he wasn't able to participate in the group discussion. So he, he just railed on this one poor guy. So the kid and his college kids ended up crying in class. And he was going to come around and see if we could, and no one had read this assignment.

So everyone was scared. But at the end, it was all set up. The kid, he said, I'm a I want to demonstrate some form of communication to this kid or to the class. But it was so intense that the kid, I think that was natural, he ended up breaking down. So, yeah, you can't hide behind that.

Yeah, so I think what he's doing, he's written to believers, scattered, but then he turns aside and he directs fire and condemnation to the ungodly, just for a minute, to show the believers, you know, something about God. You see what I, does that make sense?

So I have here, he addresses the ungodly to show his flock, his brethren, that God realizes and acknowledges these filthy rich men were responsible for their sufferings. And he does this for the benefit of the Christian readers, and God will circle back and judge later, and that's what he wants them to know. Like an Old Testament prophet, James denounces the wonton luxury of the rich, warning of their coming doom. That's Adamson and the constables.

Yeah. You know, Bob likes Jameson, Fawcett, and Brown, and their commentary says that James intends this address to rich Jewish unbelievers, not so much for themselves as for the saints, like you were saying, that they may bear with patience the violence of the rich, knowing that God will speedily avenge them on their oppression. Oh, good. I'm glad you read that because I thought you were going to take the other. This is pretty cool. Yeah, okay good, so we're on the same, but you can take it the other way too.

It's I think it's it's kind of whatever you have Yeah, so the background of this is almost verbatim Jesus says do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy that sounds familiar or three thieves breaking and steel but store up yourselves treasures in heaven and where neither moth nor rust destroys, where thieves cannot break in and steal, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. This is important. In Luke 12, starting with verse 14, Jesus says, Beware, be on your guard against every form of greed, for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.

And he told this parable. And I'll skip down to this rich man. The land of a rich man was very productive. And he began reasoning with himself, saying, what shall I do, since I have no place to store all my crops? This is what I'll do. I'll tear down my barns, my smaller barns, and build larger ones. And there I will store all my grain and all my goods. And I will say to my soul, soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come. Take your ease, eat and drink, Mary. But God says to him, you fool, this very night your soul will be required of you. And now you, who will own what you have prepared? So is the man who has stored up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.

And Jesus said that. Right after the man, there was an unidentified man who asked Jesus to tell. his brother to share the inheritances. Yeah, tell your brother to... So that's good, that's the context of that. Jesus says, no, here's what's really going on.

Luke 12, sell your visions and give to charity so everyone signs over your title deeds. Your house is to me. Money belts that do not wear out. And I just wanted to do this, where neither thief comes nor a moth destroys. So there that is again. Echoing, you know, verse 2 there in James 5. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

So that's the background of, you know, one through three here in James. And I don't think James was on these, he wasn't quite a disciple, was he? He was the half-brother. He was with his other half-brother and his mother, and they tried to get in to see him, but Jesus said, So after Jesus died on the cross and was resurrected, then James came to faith. And so I don't know how he has this so down, but I think I know it's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit sort of gave him this information of what Jesus said during his time in ministry.

Oh, here's a book. This is fun. Did God institute to have earthly goods rot and be destroyed by moths and be rusted away? Some basic principle. Well, that's good. Yeah, that's a good movie too, right? In the 1930s. He instituted death, you know, so everything How about the second law of thermodynamics? I'm kind of fascinated with this.

As a consequence of original sin, God has these laws in place, these natural laws, and that law states that energy can neither be created nor destroyed. Oh, the first law says, I'm sorry, here's the first law. Energy cannot be created or destroyed under any circumstance, but can transfer from one form to another. And forget that little formula there.

I just copied that because I think it's kind of cool. I think that's the second law. I'll have to change this. I think that's the second law of thermodynamics. That's the equation for the second law? I think so. So I don't think it's the first law. Yeah, it's not. The first law doesn't have a formula because it's just what it is, I think.

So anyway, the second law states that matter or energy has a natural tendency in an isolated system to degenerate to a more disordered state, and that's what he's talking about there. Rusting, garments becoming moth-eaten, just, you know, you get old, your car, your brand new car isn't so brand new anymore, everything comes to a disordered state. So who put all this energy into the system to begin with?

Right, yeah. So are you saying that before the fall there was no first and second law? Exactly. Roger, what do you think? Yeah, I think so. Yeah. But in a sense, I think it's a consequence of sin. Yeah, well, you know, in 512 we've been studying, you know, and death spread to all men. I mean, there's death, and that means on the whole creation, death spread. Right.

And the second law is so cool. It's why when you drive and you come here, your car engine is really warm, right? You could cook an egg on it, right? And that's all dissipated energy, right? If it was contained in the system, that's all energy going to a different form. So here's God's intended principle for the use of money. What do you think God's primary principle for the use of money is. It's not so scientific. Yeah, it's not.

Anyone? Use it for the kingdom. Ooh, well, close, but no. A little close, too. How about for his glory? Right. Use it for his glory. And I'll get to that, that kingdom. Yes. So Macaulay says, put money to profitable use. It has to be in movement. It has to move through your possession and not sit and accumulate, which... That's pretty easy to do, actually. Right. It flows in, flows in, yeah. It comes in, goes right out. And really fast, too, which is good. That's good.

Because you think about wealthy man with building larger barns, Now, you have to say, I don't want to say that investing is bad, because that's putting money to work. You're not working, but the money is being put to work. Well, Christ actually made a particular point of that. He was very hard on the person that didn't invest his money. Yeah, so investing is good.

It's just this sitting and accumulating. If anyone saw the Citizen Kane, right? If you remember that. All of his stuff was in these warehouses at the end of his life. He was trying to get this one thing and he had it in his possession all along in one of his large warehouses. So Matthew 25 is a parable saying about that faithful servants. One servant is given one talent and he buries it in the ground until his master returned. But that was evil. He shouldn't have done that. He buried it. But the servant who, with the five talents, doubled his master's money, he gave him back ten talents.

So, you know, we studied physics. Now, ROI, that's finance. Return on investment, that was 100%. So we're going to get smart in this class today because we're doing more of this. We're doing thermodynamics and... One more. From economics to some, the sum of the supply of money is in economics called M1. And it is to move through the economy and do productive things, or move through your hands and do productive things, godly things. And M2, anyone guess what M2 is in economics? I forgot this long ago because I knew this. Is it the movement of money?

Good. Yes, it's the velocity of money. Velocity. Velocity. So money has a velocity that moves. So if it's one, it'll just go out in the economy, come back in a year. And if it doubles, it'll have a velocity, M2 of two. If it's going three times as fast, I think three. I'm not sure about how the number works, but that's M2. So we have physics, finance and economics there. So there'll be tests after.

So yeah, just don't hoard your wealth is the concept that he's getting across here. Wealth in the first century Roman economy was comprised of mainly three things, three types. Garments, which I didn't know, but yeah, costly garments was a form of wealth. Oil and corn and then gold and silver possession were three sectors of wealth in this time. That's why, you know, we're dealing with garments and things like that and gold and silver in these verses. So your riches have become rotted. Oil and corn will rot if stored, right, and not put to use.

If it's stored in barns or storage facility. Now in this day and age we have preservatives and so we can but you're when you do that you're you're counteracting that second law in the second law of thermodynamics wants it to rot but it kind of offsets that so it's kind of an interesting thing to think about.

So garments if sitting in a closet become food for moths. Has anyone had that problem with their clothes in their closets? I have. You know, you find moths in your house. I think the climate here might make it. Well, it's hard. I don't remember when there's a moth infest. You know, those Miller moths that come through? Yeah, you'll find them in your clothes. Christ's garments were even valuable.

Right? What happened to them? Anybody remember? He was crucified. Yeah, his tunic. So they had some value. So the Roman soldiers wanted them. They cast lots for those. So garments are valuable. Gold and silver rust, which it doesn't really rust, but I think in our modern scientific knowledge, we could say corrodes.

Tarnishes. Tarnishes. That's good. Yeah, but tarnish, you can kind of... You can buff it up. Yeah, right, right. But it's a corrosive thing, right? Tarnish? Yeah, the exterior of the silver and gold, when it tarnishes it, it's a level of corrosion there. Yeah. So when you polish it, you're taking off some of the gold or silver. Yeah.

And so, same thing. And he calls it rust here, but same kind of principle at work, right? It oxidizes, is what I was saying. When it oxidizes, it shatters. See, it's scientific. Second law of thermodynamics. What does it mean by this rusting or gold and silver's corrosion will be a witness against them?

This is kind of a hard concept, I found. And I didn't have any really special thing to say about it, but I Ironside did, and he said, gold and silver, the gold and silver stored, they have stored up, will become cankered. I like that word. And I think that's in the King James Version. It'll become cankered.

And the rest of them will become a witness against them testifying to the greed and covetousness that led them to lay up vast stores of useless pelth. that might have been used for the glory of God, alleviating human misery, or if the heart had been right in furthering the work of the Kingdom of God. Now, back to you, Carol. I don't think that last part is right. I don't agree with that.

The Kingdom of God is going to happen by God Himself, by Christ. all of a sudden we're going to be raptured and there you go, we're in the kingdom of God. So we can't spend money, because we don't know what to spend it on to further the kingdom of God. It's just going to happen all of a sudden. And right now we're in this, the 69th week of Daniel and the 70th week of Daniel, the tribulation, we're in this right this pause period where nothing's and it keeps going it keeps rolling on but so the kingdom is paused right now is what I come but think this is an interesting thing because I thought of this this wrath becoming a witness against them testifying to their greed it's like do you know the story picture of Dorian Gray So he had, young man, he had a beautiful painting of himself that he really loved.

And it was, he was a gorgeous man stuff. And it was just, but down in his basement, he had another painting. that was, that changed, and it changed according to how his soul, or his old man was, and it was hideous, just hideous. He'd go down there and he was horrified by it. So that was a witness against the tradition of pure embraced soul. So I think that's, That's what it's kind of saying here, and Ironside, it's kind of a parallel thought there.

Yeah. You know, the GFB commentary says, in the day of... Rust isn't witnessing this, he says, in the day of judgment, namely, that your riches were of no profit to anyone, lying unemployed and so contracting rust. Where was that again? Jameson's Fossett. Okay, yeah, okay. You know, the riches did nobody any good, not even themselves. They were just lying there gathering dust. Yeah.

So they're a witness against you, the foolishness that you did. Yeah, and you see it physically by the rusting or the corrosion, and that should be a witness. your flesh will be consumed like fire, in verse 3 there. Same thing, you know? It's just a testament to what happens to your soul.

It's the same thing with the man who hid the treasure in the ground. It made no profit, didn't do anybody any good, and just sat there and corroded. Yeah, and I would have thought I'm glad that wasn't me because I've done the same thing just so I didn't lose it, you know or something I'm glad it yeah. Well, Jesus said, you know, the least you could have done is put it in the bank and gain interest Yeah, you're right and he says that in that same parable, right?

Yeah So, let's go back to James 1 10 11 and where James says, and the rich man is to glory in this humiliation, because like flowering grass, he will pass away, his flesh will pass away, for the sun rises with a scorching wind and withers the grass, and the flower falls off, and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed. So he's talking about flesh there, and when you get old You know, your flesh, wrinkles, and I'm looking at this, I've got, I'm trying to see how much gray I have coming in, so I'm testing it right here.

And I do, so this is the second month, third month. It is, yeah. Or I want it to look like Taddeo. I always admired Taddeo when we did Bible study. So I'm trying to get his look. He looks white. He's younger than me. So the flower falls off and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed, and his pursuits will fade away.

And same what Peter says in 1 Peter 1.24, all flesh is like grass, it withers, flower falls off. He's quoting Isaiah 40 there. So it's all the same, it's all the same thing that he's describing. Oh, so 5.3 Part C, and I've kind of repurpose this graph that we've had here many times at Holly Hills.

So we have a timeline. The Church Age, we're in there now. Tribulation, seven years at the bottom. Millennial Kingdom, a thousand years. So the Day of the Lord is all that's in yellow. And, you know, the Church gets raptured right there. The Alive in Christ are raptured at the beginning of the Tribulation. Tribulation Saints are resurrected there at the end. Christ's Second Coming right there at the beginning of the Millennial Kingdom.

All that stuff. Okay, so not to go into detail about that, but here's what he's telling these rich, unbelieving men here are, you are here storing up your treasure. And there they are, right before it, you know, it's going to all end in the day of the Lord. So you're very close. So why are you doing that? So I just thought that part three, verse three, part C is just kind of illustrated in a simple little picture there. So let's go on to verse four now.

Behold the pay of your laborers who mowed your fields and which has been withheld by you, Behold, the pay of the laborers who mowed your fields, and which has been withheld by you, cries out against you. And the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of the Sabbath." So we'll stop there. So this is talking about paying your laborers.

Here's the source in the Old Testament law in Deuteronomy 24, 14 and 15. You shall not oppress a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your countrymen or one of your aliens who is in your land, in your towns, you shall give him his wages on his day before the sun sets. For he is poor and sets his heart on it so that he will not cry against you to the Lord and it become a sin to you." So even though we're not under the Old Testament law, it shows what God's heart and mind are in this matter of the payment of services.

The rich man has a job and he hires some poor needy people to work the job like harvesting. It's their lifeline and in this case they depend on the money and it pays for their food, clothing, shelter and withholding it or squabbling about it is immoral, and it has dire consequences. The poor aren't able to call a lawyer.

And I just put it in a sentence, because I always hear that commercial on KOA. Well, it says that if they don't win, they... Yeah, we saw it on the bus. We saw it on the bus, and it says you don't have to pay them. Well, they say if they don't win your case. Oh, yeah, you don't have to pay them. Yeah, that's good. And I just listened to another lawyers on yesterday, driving down, talking about car insurance and stuff. But yeah, so they can't call a lawyer. They have no advocate.

But bad news for the wealthy, the greedy men, they cry out to God. And God hears that. He hears that cry and that's bad news for those guys. So withholding pay And having, yeah, withholding pay when you have a bountiful supply of crops to sell. So this rich man is a tremendous multiplier for the rich man's balance sheet, right? Because he's got this great supply of grain that he has. Now he can sell it, but he hasn't, there's no cost. So he gets all the profit and he's cutting out the worker. So it has this tremendous multiplier on his balance sheet, right? It gets fat, big.

So it happens a lot like where I live. It happened to the guy who rents our little cabin. You know, he did this job and the wealthy homeowner wouldn't pay him. Oh, and yeah, it's like thousands. And so he kept texting the guy and eventually, you know, do you go to court? Sometimes these guys have, they can go to their, um, the guy who hires them to contractor, but it happens a lot. And these people are rich. These, these are second, third homeowner homes, vacation homes. You know, who needs that? No one really needs that. You don't need a ski house.

But yet, you know, the labor... And these are people that work on their houses? Yeah. Yeah. Who don't pay. Yeah. It happens. It happens. And they're wealthy people. Right. Right. Right. Wealthy people are not always very generous. I've learned that. Yeah. Because you're... Yeah. They notice the $4.51 charge on... Yeah.

I was, we always, when I was at the pilot, we always, we always were astonished at the balance, the settlements statement when we're closing a house. What they would, they didn't like the wire fee for $15, yeah, so. But yet, here's what they're plunking down. They're plunking down $4.2 million, but they say, what's that, $15 million?

See, that's the concept we have here. My theory on this is that James' church, the Jerusalem church, scattered because of Roman persecution. And then they were working hand-to-mouth wherever they were. And they had this very problem. They weren't getting paid. They were being oppressed by the wealthy. And James is just advocating for their cause here. And their cry has gone out to the Lord.

So verse 5. You have lived luxuriously on the earth and led a lifetime of, a life of wanton pleasure. You have fattened your hearts in the day of slaughter." Yeah, this is very parallel to the Rich Man and Luke 16, the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. Lazarus's master was habitually dressed in purple and fine linen, joyously living in splendor every day, it says in Luke 16, 19. So garments, you see, he was dressed in purple and fine linen. Garments is a source of wealth here in this day and age.

J. Vernon McGee, he says that somehow Lazarus's condition was related to the rich man. So whether the rich man hired Lazarus one time, but he was responsible, and Lazarus may have declined in health and vigor and was unable to physically even walk. That's why they had to carry him to this guy's door. So they're not living just luxuriously, and that's cufeo, which means delicately, or living a soft life. The King James in the interlinear has daintily, they're daintily living.

Oh, that interesting daintily. Yeah. Yeah. So add to that, and then on top pile on top of that, they're living a life of wanton pleasure, which is a lot tail, which adds the concept of voluptuous, they're living voluptuously, or voluptuousness. Isn't that amazing? They're, I mean, they're really So here's what I have.

They're living with chiffon and lace, bonbons, truffles and cream, champagne and caviar. So McGee says this, J. Vernon McGee, God doesn't condemn the wealth, but he condemns the manner in which they got it and what it's done. When you have wealth, what you do with it is the important thing. Lazarus is rich man and James is rich man and James chapter 5 here is hoarding money. So that's not good.

The result of living in wanton luxury and pleasure Eating bonbons and cream and champagne and caviar leads to weight gain and most likely pericardial fat. Pericardial fat. What does that mean? Fat around your heart, right? And isn't that what the verse says exactly? Fat in your hearts in the day of slaughter.

There you go. And so now we cover medicine. So we've got economics, finance, banking, economics. We're smart here. So James 1 through 6 of chapter 5 is not only a denunciation of ill-gotten riches, but I should have that kind of switched around. It's a denunciation of riches. And I'm just trying to read what I wrote there. But you're becoming a bra for God's righteous consumption.

So don't do it. You know what foie gras is? It's a goose. It's a fattened goose and a fattened cow are headed for bad times. So they force feed geese and they do this in French. They'd never do it here, because the PETA people would. But they first eat the goose, and then their liver becomes fat. And then they eat the liver. That's foie gras. They eat the liver.

So it's just interesting. McGee says, James is telling the godly, they live in a godless world. And the ritual press impose hardships on them, take advantage of them. It's a consequence of being in the world. And that's a little review of what we've kind of covered. In this world you'll have joy. See my head is in joy. In this world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world.

So the last part of this, verse 6, you have condemned and put to death the righteous man. He does not resist you. Again, the righteous man is able to triumph against the poor wage owner in court, and the laborer isn't even able to bring a legal plea against him. So hence, he cries out to God. This worker needs his wages for basic sustenance, and if it's withheld, he could die, is what Constable says.

So it's very important. And McGee has Lazarus in this dire condition we discussed before due to a similar situation. That's just his theory. It's interesting to think about that. So, verse 6 is charged by God against the rich. Wealthy man hoarding is more tremendous than those denunciations that James gives prior to that. So the rich man's guilt is even less excusable due to this verse 6 here. So it's important to note the King James Version here. The rich landowners keeping verse 4, the back pay, the back wages in verse 4, for himself by fraud, is fraudulent, is the concept here.

And this throws the the situation to a legal issue, but be of good cheer. The case will be heard by God himself. Court will be in session. The court date is the coming of the Lord, which we'll see in verse 6 next week. One critical feature of the thousand-year kingdom of Christ is his personal judgment. He's here on earth bodily and physically to be judged during an executioner. He'll judge righteously money in the millennial kingdom so That's where we'll stop that's It's kind of heavy isn't But next week. I think it's a little lighter Wilson.

We'll see but next week we go to it goes back to the righteous right he switches his focus back to He calls them brethren, so he's going to address his brethren. So that's why these one through six is kind of, it's not written to those guys, but he's writing to his brethren. He's just taking it about those guys. Yeah, about them. Right. Because we have this rule here at Collier Hills that scripture is not written to unbelievers. So, so just for their benefits. Okay.

Let's close in prayer. Our Heavenly Father. We thank you for these rich words in James, and we just pray that you'll give us wisdom to understand them and to incorporate these principles of having money and having wealth and using it righteously and according to your will. And we pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.