In today’s exploration, uncover the importance of pouring out your heart to God. Recapture the blessings of an open heart and the grace that follows through meaningful prayer. Dr. McGee reads from the wisdom of mystic Fenelon, offering a blueprint for sincere communication with the divine. Discussing the nature of judgment and planning, this episode encourages listeners to live with humility and reminds us of life’s true purpose and brevity. Engage with us as Steve Schwetz provides resources for deepening your spiritual journey.
Well, that’s what we’re talking about on Through the Bible with Dr. J. Vernon McGee. I’m Steve Schwetz. Grateful that you’re here as we continue this amazing five-year journey through God’s entire Word. Now, as we near the end of our studies in James, it’s a great time to get Dr. McGee’s free notes and outlines for our next study in the Old Testament book of Joel. They’re available in our app and online at ttb.org. Just look for Briefing the Bible. Or to request the paperback copy by phone, you can call us at 1-800-65-BIBLE. But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, we still have some important ground to cover in our journey through James. Are you enjoying this study? I know that I am. We love to hear how God is moving in your heart and your life through our time in his word together. So why don’t you share your story in the feedback section of our app or email us at BibleBus at TTB.org. We really are grateful for each letter, each note, each email that we get. Like this one from Greg in Sierra Vista, Arizona. Dear Steve, you certainly do not know me, but you, along with Dr. McGee, are a daily part of my wife’s and my life and have been for years now. We begin every single day with you and the way God uses it to bring light on the word of God in this troubled time is for us like air or water or sunshine. It is such a fundamental part of our lives and it is something that we cannot imagine living without. We love our local Bible believing church, but it is Dr. McGee’s presentation of the word that is the spiritual ground and the strong foundation on which we stand. the spiritual sustenance on which we feed, and the spiritual lifeblood that gives us living hope in the resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I felt compelled to write you just to shout out a monumental thank you. I hear through the program about all the tremendous works this ministry is doing around the world. bringing new believers to Jesus Christ and helping them believe and then feeding them spiritually. This is wonderful, but it is only a secondhand account. What truly brings these stories to life for me is reflecting on the tremendous impact you have had and continue to have on our lives and then realizing that people all over the world are receiving the same tremendous blessings. While we can never know what the future holds, I do know that for every new day God grants my wife and me, we will continue to take our warm and comfortable seats on the Bible bus. Hold that door open for us, Steve. We’ll be with you every day. Boy, you know, that’s great. Thanks. And you can consider your seats saved. Now here’s an email from Randy. I pray for each of you daily and thank the Lord that you have maintained his ministry all these years. Thanks, Randy, so much for that. He continues. The small gift that I send every month is not enough compared to the benefits I receive. I’ve been praying and studying every morning that I can. Thank you for helping me in my walk through this valley of the shadow of death without fear, only reverence and love for our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I’m in your debt. Well, Randy, that’s a debt of grace that we all owe our Lord Jesus, and we’re grateful for your fellowship on the Bible bus with us. Let’s pray. And let’s also praise God for his work in our lives. Our gracious Heavenly Father, thank you. Thank you for this time in your word, and thank you for all those who study alongside us every day. We ask that you give us your wisdom, you’d stir faith in our hearts, and you’d help us to act on the things that we learn. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen. Amen. Here’s our study of James 4 as we go through the Bible with Dr. J. Vernon McKee.
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Now, friends, when we got in the fourth chapter last time, the subject here is the vacuity and vapidness of worldliness. And we found out here that worldliness actually is strife. Lust here, when he says that the lust, that war in your member, that’s sensual pleasures actually. And it wars in your members. What is it? Strife and turmoil is created by conflicts and overweening demands of the members of the body of Christ for satisfaction. And that’s true in our own physical bodies. Selfish desires, he makes very clear, lead to war. And this spirit of strife is worldliness. This is not Christian, and it’s not the Christian approach. The desires should be taken in prayer to the Lord to have them satisfied or denied or refined and to accept it from him. I want to share with you today something I’ve shared before. I carry it in the back of my Bible everywhere I go. And every now and then I get it out and read it. And I’ve certainly attempted to incorporate this in my prayer life. What is the cure of worldliness? Primarily it’s prayer. Faith, therefore, in God. And John put it like that. This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith, or even the faith. It is absolutely… trusting God and going to Him in prayer and committing that which is in your heart. And when you find that there’s strife and envy there, talk to Him about it. Many of us, we go to the Lord and tell Him how good we are. And because we’ve been good little boys and girls and we went to Sunday school, He ought to give us a lollipop or a brownie pin or something like that. Now, let’s get right down to the nitty-gritty, friends, where we live today. Will you listen to this? And this was written by a great saint, a mystic of the Middle Ages, Phanelon. I’m reading it. “‘Tell God all that’s in your heart, as one unloads one’s heart, its pleasures and its pains, to a dear friend. Tell him your troubles, that he may comfort you. Tell him your joys, that he may sober them. Tell him your longings, that he may purify them.’ Tell him your dislikes, that he may help you to conquer them. Talk to him of your temptations, that he may shield you from them. Show him the wounds of your heart, that he may heal them. Lay bare your indifference to good, your depraved taste for evil, your instability. Tell him how self-love makes you unjust to others, how vanity tempts you to be insincere, how pride disguises you to yourself as to others. If you thus pour out all your weaknesses, needs, troubles, there’ll be no lack of what to say. You will never exhaust the subject. It’s continually being renewed. People who have no secrets from each other never want subjects of conversation. They do not weigh their words, for there is nothing to be held back. Neither do they seek for something to say. They talk out of the abundance of the heart without consideration just what they think. Blessed are they who attain to such familiar, unreserved intercourse with God. I was laid aside, as many of you know, with hepatitis for some time. And I found out all things work together for good. It enabled me and my wife because we found ourselves sitting at home for a longer period of time than we had ever done since we got married. We started out on our honeymoon, and on our honeymoon, I tried out at a church. And from that day to this, we’ve been running. And there was some things we needed really to talk over that maybe could have been misunderstood at the first, you see. And we had wonderful talks. And we just laid bare our hearts to each other. And it’s the most wonderful experience. And as I said to her every night, I said, honey. This is more wonderful than a honeymoon was. Well, may I say to you, friends, that’s a relationship we ought to have with God. And if I may be personal again. After I read this and studied the Word of God, I came to the conclusion I was going to tell the Lord Jesus everything. And friends, I have talked to him in such a way that if he told the authorities today what I’ve told him, I guess they’d send me to the penitentiary. But he knows, he understands, and he’s forgiven. And I’ve told him everything. Now, the only thing in the world, friends, that can take that envy and jealousy and strife out of your heart and that restlessness that’s there today, you don’t need to go to the psychiatrist. He’ll just move your problem from one area to another. What you need to do is to get rid of that hang-up. It’s just to go to the Lord Jesus, get on his couch, and tell him everything. Now, that’s what he’s saying here is the solution to this thing here. And that’s the reason today that you and I, we pray, but we pray for selfish ends, as he says here, to satisfy our own lusts. And then we are willing to compromise with the world in order to attain our goal. And he calls us an adulterer and adulteress. The friendship of the world is enmity with God. Listen to him. He’s going to continue to talk now. Verse 5 of chapter 4 of James. Will you listen to him? Do you think that the scripture saith in vain, the spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy? What are we trying to do? Kid ourselves today that we are nice, sweet little folk and that there’s no envy and jealousy in our hearts? I heard a woman say one time, she says, well, I have a very wonderful husband. He’s not jealous of me. I tell you, I want you to know that there’s something wrong if the husband’s not jealous of his wife. He’s to be that way. And God says he’s jealous of us today also. But What about jealousy in the wrong way? Jealous that you and I didn’t get elected to a committee or didn’t get recognition in the church. And we cause strife with these tongues of ours. May I say to you, he says, why don’t you go to the Lord Jesus and tell him your problem? Get on his couch and tell him everything. That’s the solution to your problem, friend. But wait a minute. He has some more things to say. But he giveth more grace, wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but he giveth grace unto the humble. Now, we’ve said this again and again. God is overloaded with grace. You and I just don’t know how gracious he is. And he has abundance of grace. Grace means unmerited favor, but I call it love in action. God didn’t save his beloved. He gave his son, and now by grace… And he’s got so much of it. Somebody says, oh, I’m so wrong on the inside. Go and tell him you’re wrong on the inside and ask him for grace to overcome it. He’ll give you grace. He’s the living Christ up there for you. Now there’s something on our side. Remember, submit yourselves, therefore, to God. Now, you go to a doctor and submit to him. My doctor gave me, when I was sick, a half a dozen prescriptions to take. I didn’t know a man might have been poisoning me, but I had faith in him. And I took his pills, and they helped me. I submitted to him. Submit yourselves, therefore, to God. Submit to him and resist the devil, and he’ll flee from you. Now, a great many people say, well, how in the world am I going to resist the devil? Well, we’re dealing now with something that’s very practical. He says that we need a little more grace, you see, because he gives grace to the humble, and you’ll not be able to do it in your own strength. You and I are surrounded by evil influences, and Christians are not alone in this. Temptation, as we’ve seen on every hand, God supplies this grace as needed, and he supply that he has never runs out. You see, this is yours, God says. You are to lay hold of it. Now, some today may doubt the surplus of grace. May I say to you, all the medicine in the world won’t cure the sick. The remedy must be taken, the bottle of medicine. God has the grace. Lay hold of it. There may be a wonderful spring right in front of you. You may be dying of thirst. You’ve got to appropriate it. You’ve got to put your mouth down in that water and lap it up like a dog. May I say to you that you don’t blame soap and water because dirty people are in the world, do you? There’s plenty of water and soap today to clean you up. God resisted the proud. He giveth grace to the humble. And this is the kind of container that the grace of God must be carried in, must be carried in an humble individual. He says, draw near to God and he’ll draw near to you. God gets to the door of your heart and he won’t come any farther. He knocks and you’ve got to let him in. And that’s the only way he’s going to get in, my friend. By the way, Martin Luther, one time he threw an inkwell at the devil. Well, somebody says that is a crazy thing to do. Not if you’re resisting the devil. And the way to do it is draw near to God. That’s the answer. And he’ll flee from you. Because the devil doesn’t like God as a company. And the devil doesn’t get to you unless you get too far away. You see, a wolf never tacks a sheep as long as he’s with the rest of the sheep and with the shepherd. And the closer he is to the shepherd… the safer that he is. The problem with us is we get too far from God. Now he says here, be afflicted and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness. There are certain conditions that call for mourning, not for joy. Sin is never to be treated lightly, my friend. When I hear a Christian today make light of sin, I have a sneaking notion that at the side when nobody’s looking, he’s indulging in it. You don’t treat sin lightly. You mourn over your sin. And that’s the problem today. Now, someone has said, we’ve had some great evangelistic meetings here in our day. And now there’s several outstanding evangelists out. Now, why isn’t there revival in the church? I think that I can give you just some little inkling of it. I don’t mean I have the solution. I just mean here’s something for you to think about because James is telling this to us here. What is the problem today? I can remember Dr. John Brown, who was one of the greatest evangelists in the past. I was sitting on his front porch back in Salem Springs, Arkansas, many years ago. I asked him the question, why is it even way back there that evangelism was not reviving the church as it did in his day? He says, well, he said, you know, call me Dr. McGee says, Dr. McGee, I held a great meeting in Pasadena where you live. And he says, I had a tent on the corner of Washington and Holliston Street. There was a big vacant lot there at the time. And I had a tent. He said, I preached six weeks to Christians before I ever attempted to give an altar call for the unsaved. And revival came to the church. I came to a church in Pasadena where you could still see the effects of the meeting of that man in the church. Why? Well, for the very simple reason, my friend, that sin had been dealt with in the lives of believers. And that’s the problem today. that there is a refusal to deal with it. We need to mourn today over certain situations, and we need to humble yourselves, as he says in verse 10, in the sight of God, and he’ll lift you up. That’s our problem today. We think we’re smart. We think we’re strong. We think we have ability. We think we’re good. God says there’s no good within us. There’s nothing in us that attracts him. That is the way of goodness. It’s just our great need. And if we’re willing to humble ourselves, get down where he can lift us up, he’ll lift us up. You know, when a fella is out drowning, I noticed one time a soft lifeguard take his fist, hit a fella and knocked him out. Why? He was struggling. He said he couldn’t help him until that fella gave up. And God, I think sometimes has to give us the fists. for us to just give up and let him take over. Now, he says, speak not evil one to another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brother and judgeth his brother speaketh evil of the law and judgeth the law. But if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge. In other words, who do you think you are when you begin to talk like that? Who do you think you are? You’re moving in the position of God. There are two types of people today. that take the position of God. One is the sinner says, I’m good enough to be saved. And he says, Lord, I don’t need your salvation. You just move over. I’m going to move up and sit on the side of you because I am my own savior. And God says he’s the only savior. But this fellow says, move over, God. I want to sit down by the side of you. I can save myself. And then here’s the other fellow today. He sits in judgment on everybody else. Doesn’t judge himself, but he judges everybody else. And what he’s saying, judgment is for God. Even God the Father said, I’ve committed all judgment to the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, there’s many Christians, says to the Lord Jesus, you move over, I’m going to help you. We’re going to have a supreme court, and I’m going to be one of the judges. We’ve got a lot of those today. Boy, what a supreme court. The church could furnish him today. But you know, you judge yourself, and you go to him, and go in humility. There is one lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy. Who art thou that judgest another? Well, what’s the big idea? When you get the idea, you can set judgment on others. Now, verse 13. And may I say this? And I want to say it kindly. I read a great many letters. Our mail is fabulous. But every reader sends to me every letter of criticism. I want to know. And the very interesting thing is that when I start reading some letters I never finish them. I pitch them in a wastebasket. One came the other day, about 10 pages started in. Now, Dr. McGee, I like your teaching, but you need to recognize that you have made a terrible mistake. I handle those personally with the Lord Jesus, not with you, because he’s my judge and you’re not. So I put the letter in the wastebasket. I file it here in this square file that I have. Now, Let’s keep reading. Come now, ye that say today or tomorrow we’ll go into such a city and continue there a year and buy and sell and get gain. And here’s something else Christians do, making these big plans for the future. I’ve learned, it took me a long time in life to get to this place, that I just play it by ear. And today… Oh, I accept engagements ahead, but when I got this hepatitis, I had to cancel some, and I hated to cancel them. And I thought of this passage of Scripture here. Come now, ye that say, today or tomorrow we’ll go into such a city and hold a Bible conference. We’ll have a wonderful time, and we believe it’s the Lord’s will. That’s not exactly what it says here, but it’s what God said to me. Verse 14, Whereas ye know not what shall be on the next day. You don’t know. For what is your life? What is your life? Well, it’s even a vapor that appears for the little time and then vanishes away. For ye ought to say, if the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that. But now ye rejoice in your boastings. All such rejoicing is evil. Therefore to him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it’s sin. And there are a great many people today that are sinning and don’t know it. If you know to do good in certain cases, that you should do certain things. should help a certain cause, and you don’t do it. That is sin, my friend. But let’s come back here to see what is your life. Well, actually, your life is just, he says here, is a vapor or a fog. Have you noticed that? It’s like a vapor that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away. Well, we have a lot of it here on the West Coast. You can have a marvelous day. The water in the ocean is as blue as indigo. And the sky above is almost as blue. And everything is just wonderful. And then you stop at a motel for the night. You get up the next morning and everything is covered with fog. And it’s a ground fog. And you don’t start out early because you hear on the radio that there’s been traffic accidents during the night. Planes are grounded. Now, human life lived apart from and without God is the most colossal failure in God’s universe. Everything else serves a long and useful purpose. The sun in the sky. prodigal of its energy. We only get a little of it on this. The moon serves a purpose. Many of you fellas got married because of that moon up there. It serves a purpose. And the poet is the one who said, only man is vile down here. Human life is out of joint, dislocated, and it’s a colossal failure. And I could mention many reasons, but one of the reasons is the brevity of of human life down here. You only get three score and ten, and then if you get any more, it’s with aches and pains, and aches and pains get to you before then. All the gravity of human life down here, and many of us really never learn to live down here upon the earth, and because of that, You and I today ought not to spend our time in strife and envy and jealousy. Spoils the life, you see. Oh, to come to Christ and put your life down before him and really start living, friends. That’s what a great many of us. He says, I’ve come that you might have life, that you might have it more abundantly. He wants to give you a life that’s life indeed. By the way, are you living that life today? May God richly bless you, my beloved.
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It’s true. Life is so short. And you know, the older we get, the faster time seems to fly, doesn’t it? Well, if you realize that it’s time that you start living, I mean really living, then you’re in the right place. We’ve got some free resources that will tell you more about God’s great love for you and how to have the abundant life that Dr. McGee talked about. In our app or online at ttb.org, you can click on How Can I Know God to read or listen to them. Or call 1-800-65-BIBLE and we’ll send a packet of material to you by mail. Now, in our study, we heard Dr. McGee read a passage by Fenelon that he kept in the back of his own Bible. To read it, just go to ttb.org. If we can help you find it, call us at 1-800-65-BIBLE. You can also write to us at Box 7100, Pasadena, California, 91109. In Canada, Box 25325. London, Ontario, N6C 6B1. Does the Bible condemn a person for being rich? Well, find out next time as we continue to make our way through the Bible.
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All to him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow.
SPEAKER 01 :
Today’s study with Dr. J. Vernon McGee is brought to you by Through the Bible, and it’s made possible by the generous prayer and financial investments from listeners like you on the Bible bus all around the world.
