In the early 1900’s, humorist Finley Peter Dunne said that “The newspaper does everything for us. It runs the police force and the banks, commands the militia, controls the legislature, baptizes the young, marries the foolish, comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable, buries the dead, and roasts them afterward.” Many of us have heard that expression “comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable.” Some might assume it came from scripture, and might be disappointed to discover it came from the lips of 1900’s era comedian!

Although the words “comforting the afflicted” and “afflicting the comfortable” are not found in scripture, that IS in fact the very thing the word of God does. It’s true for today’s passage, James 1:9-11. Here God gives us truths which should comfort the poorest and most afflicted of us; and humble the most lofty among us.

He begins this section with the word, “But,” making a transition from our passage last week in :6-8, about how the one who doesn’t have a total commitment to the Lord will be unstable in ALL his ways. He says, “BUT” – you who are really committed to the Lord, whether men consider your position in life to be high or low – you need to make sure you see yourself the way that GOD sees you. When you do, it will indeed “comfort the afflicted” and “afflict the comfortable.”

I. Real Faith Comforts the Afflicted
:9 “But let the brother of humble circumstances glory in his high position.”
“The brother of humble circumstances” refers to a person who is not well-off financially. It is contrasted with “the rich man” in :10, so we know it is speaking about material poverty.

There were a lot of poor members in the churches James was addressing in his letter. James said he was writing to those who were “dispersed abroad” – they’d been forced out of Judea by persecution to Northern Palestine and Syria. So they were what we would call “refugees,” and of course many of them were not well-off as a result. Paul wrote in I Corinthians 1 that there were “not many wise, not many mighty, not many noble” in the early church, and scholars have examined letters that some of those early Christians wrote to each other, and they do indicate a lowly background. We also note that Paul took an offering from the Mediterranean churches back to the church at Jerusalem. Many of them had lost their jobs and businesses because of their faith in Christ. So a number of members in the early church were poor.

But notice that James didn’t say to them: “Oh poor you!” Instead, he encouraged them to see by faith, from God’s perspective, how well off they really were. He offered comfort to the afflicted.
 

What comfort is there in being poor & afflicted? First of all, we need to recognize he’s not saying that ALL poor and afflicted people are blessed. There is no inherent blessing in being poor! But James says “Let the BROTHER of humble circumstances” glory. The word “brother” here means he’s speaking about a Christian who is poor. He says a Christian who is poor can “glory in his high position.”

What is his “high position”? James explains in Chapter 2:5, “Listen my beloved brethren, did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?” He says, you may be poor, but if by faith you can recognize that you have sinned against God, and believe that Jesus died to pay for your sins, and if you are brought back into a relationship with God, and now your sins are forgiven and like James 2:5 says, you “love (God)” — then you are RICH! You may be poor materially, but you are rich spiritually!

In Revelation 2:9, Jesus told the church at Smyrna, “I know your tribulation and your poverty – but you are RICH”! The members of the church at Smyrna were poor according to the world, but Jesus called them rich because of all they had in Him.
— I Peter 2:9 says: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession.”
— Ephesians 1:3 says you have “every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus”.
— I Peter 1:4 says you have “an inheritance imperishable, undefiled, and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you”!
The scripture says, God’s people are RICH in Christ Jesus!
— You may be poor presently, but you will be rich eternally
— You may be despised by men, but you are loved by God Himself!
— No one on earth may know your name – but God Himself knows you personally!
— You may have a modest home here on earth, but “(you) have a home in Glory land that outshines the sun”!
THAT is the attitude of faith which “the brother of humble circumstances” shoule remember. Don’t let anyone “feel sorry” for you! There is no reason for it! You are rich in Christ Jesus! You are a child of the King!

Each summer Prince William of England and I each have a birthday in June. A few years back, he had a BIG birthday: according to the terms of his mother’s will, William would be given about 16 million dollars on his 30th birthday. Do you think when he was 16, or 20, or 24 years old, and he didn’t have all that money yet, that people felt sorry for him? Do you think they said, “Oh that poor boy?” Of course not! Everybody knew that even if he wasn’t “rich” yet, in just a few years, he was going to come into a huge inheritance! It was only a matter of time.

The Bible says that if you are a Christian, a similar thing is true for you. However lowly your financial status may be here on earth, you are a child of the King, and in a very short time, you will receive an inheritance beyond anyone’s wildest imagination, which right now is being kept for you by the power of God in heaven! Don’t feel sorry for yourself; and don’t let anyone else feel sorry for you, either. “Glory in your high position” James says! You are a child of the King! You are about to receive an imperishable inheritance!

It is also significant that James does NOT say “Let the brother of humble circumstances trust that God will make him rich in THIS world.” James’ Biblical teaching flies right in the face of the “Your Best Life Now”-type prosperity preaching, which asserts that if you are poor, and you have faith, then God will make you rich in this world. You do not see that taught in James. In Chapter 2 he says, “God has chosen the poor of this world to be rich in FAITH and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him.” It does NOT say God has chosen the poor to be rich in MONEY, here on earth! It says He has chosen for them to be rich in FAITH, and heirs of His KINGDOM. Christians are not guaranteed their “best life now” with riches here on earth. And thank God for that! I don’t want my best life NOW – this life is too short! I want my best life in ETERNITY! And THAT is what God promises us in the gospel. You may have poverty, or live very modestly, for a few years now – but you will have your best life forever in the Kingdom of God if your faith is in Jesus. That is what James says should be your focus.

This verse is a call for Christians NOT to buy in to the world’s evaluation of who you are and what you are worth. The world will look at you and judge you because of the neighborhood you live in, or the car you drive, or the school you attend, or by your looks or your clothes or your figure or your money. And if you are not careful, you will find that you are evaluating yourself by those same worldly standards. James says, DO NOT buy into that! You look at yourself the way that GOD sees you!

There’s some application for our moms here, on this Mother’s Day, isn’t there? The world may “sniff” at motherhood, and minimize it, or say “she’s ‘JUST’ a stay-at-home mom” or whatever. But God’s word says, don’t buy into that! See yourself and your God-given responsibilities the way that GOD sees you! See that there’s nothing more important in your life than these living souls that God has given you the privilege of influencing for His kingdom; to mold and shape like one else on this earth will; that will bring you rewards and love that no money or worldly accomplishment can buy. So don’t see yourself, moms, the way the world or the media sees you; see yourself the way GOD sees you. 

This is true across the board for us as Christians, not just for moms. Many of us need to constantly “preach the gospel to ourselves” every day. Say to yourself what GOD says about you in His word:

— Some of us need to look in the mirror every day and quote Ephesians 1:3, “I have every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ”! 

— Or look in the mirror and say with I Peter, “I have an inheritance imperishable, undefiled, which will not fade away, reserved for me in heaven.” 

— Or look in the mirror and say with James 2, “I am rich in faith, and an heir of the kingdom which God has promised to those who love Him.” 

— Or say with Proverbs 31 that “my children will rise up and call me blessed” if I invest my life in them as a mother (or father or grandparent!).

Let’s remind ourselves that we are not what the world sees in us. We are far more. James1 here is a word of “comfort to the afflicted.”

II. Real Faith Afflicts the Comfortable
We tend to think that those who are well-off in this world have it “made.” James  1:10 here says that they don’t. It says, “And let the rich man glory in his humiliation.” James was using a play on words here, which he does often in this book. The word “humiliation” here is the same Greek word (tapeinos) that he just used to describe “affliction” of the poor man. So you could translate it literally, “Let the afflicted glory in his high position, but let the rich man glory in his affliction.” So James says, listen, things are going to CHANGE: the poor and afflicted, are going to be rich in eternity — and many rich here on earth, will be be poor and afflicted in the next life. So these verses literally “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable”!

Now, I do believe you can be a well-off Christian in this life and still have a great reward in heaven. But the warning is: if you are well-off in this life, DO NOT put your confidence in your riches. Make sure your trust is in Christ alone. And keep a Biblical attitude towards your wealth, because James says it is not going to last — and neither are you! James says “glory in your humiliation, because like flowering grass you will soon pass away.”

Now, many of us might say, “Well, I’m not rich, this doesn’t really apply to me.” Most of us in this worship center today would not consider ourselves “rich.” And by some standards maybe none of us are, but by world standards, virtually ALL of us here today are rich. When you go to India on mission, and someone takes you to their home, and it’s about 8 x 10 feet — smaller than most of our kids bedrooms, or many of our bathroom suites! — and they point with pride to 2-3 outfits they have hanging on a nail on the wall on a hanger — when we have closets and drawers full of clothes — then you begin to realize that by world’s standards, every one of us here is rich. So James’ warning here applies to virtually all of us here in America. He says, “like flowering grass you will soon pass away.”

The analogy of mankind as being like a flower is one that was used repeatedly throughout the Old Testament:

— Isaiah 40:6-7 says, “All flesh is like grass, and all its loveliness is like the flower of grass. The grass withers, the flower fades. Surely the people are grass.” 

— Psalm 102:15-16 “As for man, his days are like grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourishes. When the wind has passed over it, it is no more, and its place acknowledges it no longer.” 

James could see what those verses describe, every day in Israel: when the sun rose, the little flowers — the anemone and cyclamen — would wither, and the wind would just blow them away.

James says that is what man in all his wealth and riches is like! He says, people often think so much of someone because they are so well off, and often they think very highly of themselves too — but, he says, DON’T; it won’t last. He says that man and all his wealth is just like one of those flowers. In a moment, it will all be gone – no matter how great or powerful one may currently be.

In Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”, Hamlet contemplates the skull of Yorick, a jester he had known, whose grave had been dug up. He asks his associate, Horatio, if he thought “Alexander the Great” –- as rich and powerful as he was — suffered a similar fate as this clown did? The answer, of course, was, yes he did! Rich and poor/weak and powerful all die, and our bodies return to the dust. Hamlet then says:

Alexander died, Alexander was buried,
Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth; of
earth we make loam; and why of that loam, whereto he
was converted, might they not stop a beer-barrel?

Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay,
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away:
O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,
Should patch a wall to expel the winter flaw!

Shakespeare dramatically makes the point that every one us – whether a lowly court jester, or mighty Caesar — live but a brief time, and then we will return to dust. One day we will all “pass away” like James says here; the “flower” of our life will fall to the ground. (Many of us can feel that happening to ourselves as we age!) So James says we need to recognize the frailty of our wealth and worldly position: even if they are very great, they won’t last. 

So James says “glory in your humiliation.” Recognize the frailty and weakness of your wealth. We can do this in several ways:

1) Realize that all your riches can suddenly be taken away. Anyone remember just a few years ago when most people lost about half the value of their stocks in a very short period of time? Do you think that can’t happen again? You think somehow all your wealth is insulated from calamity? It isn’t! Proverbs 18:11 says a rich man’s wealth is like a high wall in his own imagination. People THINK their wealth makes them safe — but it doesn’t. If you think you your riches make you secure, you are delusional; there is no security in material wealth. It can all come crashing down in a moment – and it may at any time. James says, keep a humble perspective about your riches. Glory in your humiliation. Realize that your riches can suddenly be taken away.

2) Recognize that the uses of money are very limited. Money cannot buy you everything. It is not the “end all” that so many people think it is.

For example, Sylvester Stallone is known all over the world as a movie star, and he has made multiplied millions of dollars. But his fame and fortune have not necessarily bought him happiness. Stallone told an interviewer several years ago that he wanted something that his money could not buy:  a happy home and a good marriage!

Money can’t buy everything. Money can’t buy you a good marriage or family. Money can’t heal a broken heart. And the Bible makes it clear that money certainly can’t buy you a place in heaven either. Psalm 49:8 says the redemption of your soul is costly; stop thinking you can pay for it. You can’t. Your money can’t save you. Don’t think money is everything: there is so much that it cannot do.

3) In fact, far from gaining you a place in heaven, prosperity can actually be a stumbling block which keeps you OUT of heaven. Jesus said in Matthew 19:23, “Truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven … It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” The Bible says when Jesus’ disciples heard Him say that, they were astonished; they thought the rich had all the advantages, and here was Jesus saying that most rich people would not see heaven! 

Now, Jesus did add: “With God all things are possible.” A rich person CAN be saved, but it goes SO much against the grain for a rich person to do what it takes to be saved. It’s easy for a wealthy person to have the attitude: “I’m a self-made man;” I don’t need anything. And if they bring that attitude into the spiritual realm, it will send right to hell. Because Jesus said we have to humble ourselves like a little child to enter the kingdom of heaven. We have to admit our sins, and admit that we need Jesus’ help to be saved. It can be hard for a self-reliant rich person to humble himself like that. If that’s so, then money (with its resulting pride) can really be a CURSE, not a blessing, right? It would be far better to be poor, and able to humble yourself and be saved for all eternity, than to be rich for a few short years here on earth and be cast into hell forever! You CAN be saved if you’re rich, but to do it you have to throw away all your confidence in your riches and yourself, and humble yourself and trust God’s mercy through Jesus’ death on the cross for your sins, in the same humble way as the poorest person you know! James says, rich person, if you are going to be saved, you’d better “glory in your humiliation” – because humbling yourself is the only way that you — or anyone else — will ever see heaven.

Now, let me make something clear: the Bible does NOT teach that money is bad. Scripture never says “money is the root of all evil” — that’s a misquote! (It says “the LOVE of money is A root of all KINDS of evil.”) There is nothing wrong with being rich; just make sure that your real riches are in heaven with God! That’s a good word for all of us, rich or poor: however much money God allows you to have, make sure your real treasures are in heaven. Heed Jesus’ words of warning in Matthew 6:19-20: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” 

If God has blessed you with money, then heed James’ words and “glory in (your) humiliation” – voluntarily humble yourself and make sure you’re only trusting the mercy of God through Jesus to saved you — and then make sure you’re saving up your real treasures in heaven. 

CONCLUSION:
James 1:9-11 is a great equalizer. These verses reminds us that all ground is level at the foot of the cross. All people, regardless of income, have the same requirement to get into heaven; there’s no “first class section” on the bus to heaven!  We all have to admit that we’re sinners, and humbly ask Jesus to save us, in the exact same way. 

The gospel raises the poor up to glorious riches, and it makes the rich humble themselves to enter the Kingdom. 

And it reminds us that death treats us all the same. There is a “democracy in death.” Death shows no favoritism. It comes to rich and poor alike. In fact Jesus’ story of The Rich Man & Lazarus shows the exact kind of reversal that James talks about here: poor Lazarus, who was so destitute here on earth that he begged for crumbs from the rich man’s table, went straight to comfort and glory in heaven. And the rich man, despite all his wealth on earth, went straight to hell, where he begged for just one drop of water to cool his tongue in the flame.

So many people will experience that same kind of reversal: the richest may be stripped of all their riches — while the poorest of may become rich forever. “The afflicted will be comfortable, and the comfortable afflicted.”

And the thing is, the Bible says it will all happen so quickly. That expression in :11, “IN THE MIDST OF HIS PURSUITS,” is a key phrase. We picture our lives ending when we’ve finished everything we’d hoped to accomplish. But James says, no, the end is not coming when you are “ready.” He says it’s “in the midst of his pursuits” that the rich man will pass away. In Luke 12:13-21 Jesus said it was while the rich man was planning to build yet another barn to hold his many goods that God said to him, “You fool, this night your soul is required of you.” It was “in the midst of his pursuits” that his soul was called to account. It may be the same with some of us: “in the midst of our pursuits” some of us too will be called to face God.

And on that day, it will not matter what your annual income is; it won’t matter what the square footage of your home was. It will not make one whit of difference how much you had in savings or in your IRA. You won’t drive a car to heaven; and you won’t be clothed in your finest. You will take out of this world just what you brought into it – NOTHING! You will stand before God as a naked soul. Yes, there is a great “democracy in death.” And the judgment you face before God will be the same for everyone – rich or poor:  Did you give your life to Jesus, and what did you do for Him? That’s all that will matter; not what you did or didn’t have. That should “comfort the afflicted” who give their lives to Jesus and serve Him — because they will be rich in glory. And it should “afflict the comfortable” — because if they refuse to humble themselves and serve God, they will lose everything. 

INVITATION:

How do you need to apply this word today to YOUR life:

— Some of us need to stop seeing ourselves the way the world sees us, and start seeing ourselves the way GOD sees us. Don’t judge yourself by your money, or possessions, or worldly status — and stop looking at OTHER people that way too!

— Some of us need to stop living like money and material possession are what life is all about; it not … you need to start investing your life and service and resources in God’s kingdom for eternity.

— Others of us need to stop living as if we have all the time in the world; none of us does. We are a flower that appears for a short time, that is blown away. That’s not being “morbid;” that’s reality. We need that perspective that life is short; do the most important things. Start living for God NOW!

— Some of us have never really nailed down the most important thing: your eternal relationship with God. If not, you need to do it today!