On our trip to see our grand daughters baptized, Cheryl & I stopped to see a couple of Presidential libraries, including Jimmy Carter’s in Atlanta. I had to chuckle when we stopped there, because we have an ongoing joke in our Sunday School class, as the first time I shared an illustration from Carter’s life, some of our class members had a blank look on their faces — and Cheryl pointed out that most of our class members were not even born when Jimmy Carter was President!   But perhaps my favorite President in my lifetime was Ronald Reagan. Like any man, Reagan was far from perfect, but he was a good president and certainly had a conservative political philosophy. One of the things Reagan preached was the doctrine of personal responsibility. He said:

“We must reject the idea that every time a law’s broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker. It is time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions.”

Like many things President Reagan said, that quote is like a breath of fresh air. That last sentence is especially important, that “each individual is accountable for his actions.” We live in a society today where it seems like everyone is trying to blame someone else for the ills that have befallen them. We could call this “The Blame Game”: always blaming someone else or something else for one’s problems. President Reagan called the idea that each individual is accountable for their actions an “American precept” — but the truth is, that’s not only an “American precept”; it’s a BIBLICAL precept as well. Taking responsibility for your actions — and your sins — is one of the most important steps any of us can take. Let’s see what James 1:13-16 has to teach us about “What Real Faith Looks Like: The Blame Game.”

I. “The Blame Game”: Evading Responsibility
:13 says, “Let no man say when he is tempted, ‘I am being tempted by God …’.”
This introduces the idea of who is to blame for our sins. James says here that there is a kind of person who, when they are tempted, wants to blame someone else for it. The example he gives here is of someone saying: “I am being tempted by God.” This is “The Blame Game” – blaming someone else for your sin.

“The Blame Game” has been going on since the beginning of creation, as we see in the Book of Genesis. In Chapter 3 of that book, Adam and Eve broke God’s command by eating the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil. When God confronted Adam with his sin, Adam said in :12, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.” Do you hear that? “The WOMAN … whom YOU gave me … SHE gave me from the tree …”.  Adam tried to pawn off on someone else the responsibility for his sin:

— first he said, “The WOMAN … SHE gave me and I ate.” So he was trying to say, see, God, it was HER fault, not mine!

— and if that wasn’t good enough, he also tried to blame God Himself, because he said: “The woman, whom YOU gave me”! In other words, this is really YOUR fault, God, not mine! YOU gave her to me!

One of the big problems here was that Adam was not accepting personal responsibility for what he had done. He blamed someone else: his wife, and even God, for his sin. So Adam was the father of “The Blame Game.”

Adam started it, but all mankind ever since has followed him in it.

On July 2, 1881, Charles Guiteau lay in wait at a railway station, and shot U.S. President James A. Garfield as he was passing by. Garfield did not die immediately, but sadly, due to infection from unhealthy medical procedures on the wound, he did pass away some days later.  When Guiteau was brought to trial, he submitted his plea in court to Judge Walter Cox. He said “I plead not guilty to the indictment.” He wrote: “it was God’s act and not mine. The Divine pressure on me to remove the president was so enormous that it destroyed my free agency, and therefore I am not legally responsible for my act.” Here was the “blame game” again! It wasn’t me; GOD made me do it! 

People are still playing this “blame game” today too, trying to shift the responsibility for their sin from themselves to others – anyone but themselves: 

— it was my parents’ fault. 

— It’s because I was brought up poor. 

— It’s because I had a bad environment.

— It’s because I didn’t have any education. 

— I was just “born this way” — I didn’t really have any choice about it. People who are living a gay/lesbian lifestyle often make this claim. But after years of study, by many who would love to justify it, there is still ZERO evidence of any genetic predisposition for homosexuality.  And 2nd, scripture tells us in Romans 1 that it is a result of a personal choice: “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie … they burned in their lust toward one another.” The Bible says we as individuals are responsible for our choices. We can’t just blame God or our genes or anything else for it.

But it’s easy for many of us to pick on somebody whose sin or problem is not one that we ourselves deal with. But this applies to ALL of us, and ALL of our sins, not just other people’s.

We all need to stop playing “the blame game”; we all need to stop trying to pawn off the responsibility for our sins and poor choices on someone else.  Don’t YOU say, “I was born this way;” don’t YOU say: “I just can’t help myself;” don’t YOU say “it’s my parents’ fault”, or any number of other things like that. These are just countless variations of the same “Blame Game” that Adam started in the Garden of Eden – when he blamed everyone but himself for his own sin.

Some of us right here today need to stop this “Blame Game.” Stop blaming your heredity or your parents or your environment or anyone but yourself for YOUR sin. Listen: we have ALL been born into a sinful world; we are ALL born with a sin nature, and so we all have weaknesses, some in one area, and some in another. But having a weakness in ANY area of our lives — whatever it is — does not excuse us from fighting against that temptation. Some of us may be more disposed to addiction to alcohol than others; some of us may be more physically susceptible to sexual sin than others; some of us may have a greater tendency to lying or cheating or stealing than others — but this doesn’t excuse ANY of us from our sins. We are still responsible for our own choices, our own actions, and our own sins. Whatever weakness you may have today, there is someone else, somewhere else in this world, who is fighting that very same temptation that you have, and who is overcoming it, with God’s help. So stop blaming everyone but yourself. Start taking responsibility for your own actions. Stop playing “The Blame Game.”

II. “The Blame Game”: It’s not God
Let’s look some more at this idea of “blaming God,” because James develops it some more here in James 1. We saw how In Genesis 3, Adam tried to blame God for his sin. And James says here in :14 that many others basically do the same thing: “Let no man say when he is tempted, ‘I am being tempted by God …”. In other words, he’s saying, don’t blame God for your temptations and sin. He is not responsible for that; you are.

A. The Difference Between “Trials” & “Temptations.”
Now, we need to make an important differentiation here, between “trials” and “temptations.” We have been speaking off and on for several weeks about how God brings various trials into our lives, and how He has a specific purpose for them. That is true. God DOES bring us into trials, to test our faith, and give us the opportunity to demonstrate that it is genuine, to grow and mature us, and so forth.

But there is a difference between “trials” and “temptations.” A “trial” is a difficulty God allows us to come into, to strengthen us for His purposes. A “temptation” is an allurement to sin, which God does not do to us. There is a big difference between the two.

Now, one thing that complicates our understanding of this is that the same Greek word, “peirazo,” is used for BOTH “trials” and “temptations.” In fact, it’s used for both of them right here in James 1! Earlier in James 1:2 we saw where James said that “various trials” come upon us to test our faith and produce endurance. In John 6:6 the Bible says that Jesus “said this to test him” – it’s that same word “peirazo.” So the Bible definitely teaches that God does test us.

But now here in :14 we see that no one can say when he is “tempted” that he is being “tempted by God, for God Himself cannot be tempted with sin, and He Himself does not tempt anyone.” All of these uses of the word “tempted” here, are the Greek word “peirazo” — the same Greek word that is used for “trial”!  A.T. Robertson, the highly respected Southern Baptist Greek scholar, wrote that this word “peirazo” may be used in both “good” and “bad” senses: it can mean a “test”, by God, or it can mean a “temptation” to evil, which is NOT from God. If you are studying a passage of scripture, you have to ascertain from the context which way this word is being used. But we don’t have to be Greek scholars to apply this!  In your own life experience, you can know for sure: if it is trial, it may be from God as a test; but if it is an allurement for you to do evil, that is a temptation, and it is NOT from God – because God does not tempt us to do evil, as James makes very clear next:

B. The Blamelessness of God
Verse 13 here says “Let no man say when he is tempted, ‘I am being tempted by God.’ For God cannot be tempted by sin, and He Himself does not tempt anyone.” One thing the Bible makes very clear here is that God is not responsible for temptation or sin. He is a holy God.

James says here, God is not tempted with evil. He emphasizes here the doctrine of the holiness of God. Theologians tell us that holiness is perhaps THE single most significant attribute of God taught in scripture. In heaven the angels never cease to cry out, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.” They don’t say, “Love, love, love.” They don’t say “Wise, wise, wise.” They say “Holy, holy, holy”! The Bible repeatedly emphasizes the holiness of God. God is perfectly holy. Everything He is and does is holy.
Psalm 33:4-5 says: “For the word of the Lord is upright; and all His work is done in faithfulness He loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of the lovingkindness of the Lord.” Those verses tell us that everything about God is good: His word is upright, His work is faithful, what He loves is righteous — there is NOTHING about God which is not holy and good!

And so James says God “cannot be tempted by evil.” This is an interesting phrase in the original Greek. The word is “a-peirastos.” As we saw, “Peirazo” is the word for temptation or trial. The “a” (“alpha”) at the beginning of the word is what Greek scholars called the “alpha privative”, in which the “a” functions as a negative, meaning “no” or “not.” We do this same thing in English, where we put an “a” in front a word: 

— such as “a-theist”, meaning a person who does NOT believe in God,

— or “a-gnostic”, gnosis is the word for “knowledge”, so it means “not, knowing”. 

So here the Greek is “a-peirastos”, which literally means that God is “NOT – tempted,” or as A.T. Robertson explains, it not only “un-tempted, but that He is “not-temptable”! He “cannot be tempted” – He is “a-peirastos.” It is not even possible that God could be tempted with sin. He is perfectly holy God! And as a perfectly holy God, James says, He Himself does not tempt anyone.

Now, this does brings up some questions: if God is such a holy God, then why did He allow sin and temptation in the world? That is a good question, and the answers are not uncomplicated, and they vary. Some who hold to the “doctrines of grace” (Calvinism) believe that God ordained everything, including sin, for His glory. The Calvinistic Westminster Confession says:  “God from all eternity, did … ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin.”

Now there are Calvinists that I love very dearly, and I appreciate many of the doctrines and emphases of Calvinism. But this seems to me to be “theological gymnastics” of a very difficult kind. They want to maintain on the one hand that God has sovereign control over single every detail of the universe, but then somehow affirm that He is not responsible for sin — but you can’t have it both ways. That position seems to be self-contradictory.

But whatever their disagreements, what Calvinists and non-Calvinists both agree on is that the Bible teaches in passages like James 1 here that God cannot be the author of sin. He did not choose for us to sin; we chose it ourselves. The Bible definitely teaches that God is sovereign; He reigns over all from heaven. But I believe the Bible teaches that in His sovereignty, God has granted us real, free, choices that bring real consequences for our actions. That does not compromise God’s sovereignty in any way; He’s still on the throne. But from His throne, God has sovereignly chosen to give us real choices that have real consequences. If He didn’t, this universe would be nothing more than a “rigged game show” in which He controlled every move. And that is not the universe that God created.

One of my favorite quotes about this is from C.S. Lewis in his classic book, Mere Christianity:

“God created things which had free will. That means creatures which can go either wrong or right … Why then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. A world of automata — of creatures that worked like machines — would hardly be worth creating. The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water. And for that they must be free.”

God did not create a universe inhabited by robots for whom He would determine every move they made. If He did, then He WOULD indeed be responsible for sin. But that is not what He did. He made us “in His image,” which means that we have souls, minds, and a will of our own. To make this universe to be genuinely meaningful, God allows us to make real choices, which means that we have the freedom to do either good, or bad; to do God’s will, or to sin. And we know the story: when the time came for us to make our choices, we chose to sin. But it was not GOD who chose sin for us; we chose it ourselves, and we continue to choose it for ourselves. We are the ones who are responsible. And that is what James explains in the next verse:

III. The Blame Game: Accepting Responsibility
Verse 14 says: “BUT” — as opposed to playing the “blame game,” especially blaming it on God — “BUT each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his OWN lust.” Here James encourages us to stop playing “The Blame Game” and admit that we are responsible for our own choices. We have each personally chosen to sin against God and we are each responsible for the consequences of our own sin.

The illustration James uses here is a very picturesque one. The word “enticed” here means to be “allured by bait.” It is the picture of a fisherman coaxing a fish with bait on the end of a line — but of course, that bait has a hook in it!

James says THAT is the picture of what happens to us when we sin. He says, yes, there is a tempter, who is enticing us with some “bait,” but that tempter is not God! Mark 1:13 says that Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness, and he is the same evil one who tempts us as well. Now, it’s interesting that James does actually not mention Satan here. He does mentions demons elsewhere in this book, but James doesn’t mention Satan or demons here here. Why might that be? Perhaps because what he’s trying to emphasize here is that the problem we have with sin is NOT due primarily to the demons who are working OUTSIDE of us, but because the lust we have working WITHIN us! Again: don’t play the “blame game;” don’t blame the demons; see that the problem lies within YOU!

James says when we are tempted with the “bait” that the enemy dangles in front of us, :14 says we are “carried away and enticed by his own lust.” It’s significant that the word “lust” here is SINGULAR – it is not a bunch of different “lusts,” but rather the principle of lust, or sin, within each of us. Ever since Adam & Eve first sinned, every one of us after them has inherited this sin nature inside of us, which inclines us to sin. And when we come to the time to make our own choices, we all do choose to sin. This is why we can’t just “turn over a new leaf”; we can’t just “reform ourselves.” We have to be “born again” by admitting our sin, and asking God to change our hearts through the power of His Holy Spirit and save us!

But for that to happen, we have to admit that the problem is not God, or even the devil, or anyone else. We have to admit that we are each responsible for our own sins. We are the one to blame. 

In May of 1960, in one of the most embarrassing moments in U.S. history, the Soviet Union shot down a U.S. spy plane and captured its pilot Gary Powers — after the U.S. had said publicly that we had NOT been spying on the Soviet Union. The Eisenhower administration went into “damage control.” Allen Dulles, the director of he CIA, offered to resign and to make a statement that an unnamed official had acted without the authority to do so, but President Eisenhower rejected that option. He said: “I’m not going to shift the blame to my underlings.” Clint Hill, who was a secret service agent guarding Eisenhower at that time, wrote that “Eisenhower was so distraught over the situation that he contemplated resignation. With the Paris Summit just a few days away, he decided that the only option he could live with was to come out with the truth, finally. He admitted that the administration had been involved in systematic espionage and had lied, publicly, about the U-2 flights. Eisenhower later said, ‘If anyone should be punished, they should punish me first.’ (Agent Hill wrote) President Eisenhower was not someone who looked to blame others — he would much rather accept responsibility himself.” (Five Presidents, p. 68)

What President Eisenhower did then is a good example for us today: don’t play “the Blame Game;” don’t try to shift responsibility for your sins to others. Do the Biblical, responsible thing, and admit your sin to God.
After King David had committed adultery with Bathsheba, Nathan the prophet confronted him with his sin, and 2 Samuel 12:13 says: “Then David said to Nathan, ‘I have sinned against the LORD.’ And Nathan said to David, ‘The LORD also has taken away your sin; you shall not die.’” David’s path to forgiveness began when he admitted his sin to God. He didn’t try to evade responsibility; he didn’t blame it on Bathsheba, or her husband Uriah, or anyone else. He said, “I have sinned against the Lord.”

He elaborates on that some more in Psalm 51, where he repeatedly talks about “my sin … my transgressions … my iniquity.” He said in :4, “Against You (God), You only have I sinned, and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You are justified when You speak, and blameless when You judge.”
He’s said, God, I sinned against You; I did wrong. You are right whatever You decide to do to me. David accepted responsibility for his sin.

This is what each of us needs to do too: ACCEPT PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY for your sin! That is the first step towards genuine salvation. Say with James here: “It was ‘my own lust’ that made me do it.” It wasn’t the devil who made me do it; it certainly wasn’t GOD who made me do it; no one else “made” me do it! I am responsible for my own sin. Accept responsibility.
— Stop blaming it on your parents.
— Stop blaming it on your inherited tendencies.
— Stop blaming it on your family upbringing.
— Stop blaming it on your environment.
— Stop blaming it on economic deprivation.
— Stop blaming it on your lack of education.
— Stop blaming it on your poor health.
— Stop blaming it on your friends.

— Stop blaming it on our society.
— Stop blaming it on anyone or anything else. 

— Especially stop blaming it on GOD!

Admit your own sin against God, and take responsibility for it.

You can take the biggest and most important step of your life today if you will just say: “I have sinned against the Lord.” Admit that you have chosen to sin. That’s the “ABCs of salvation” that our kids learn in VBS: “Admit your sin; Believe that Jesus died for you, and Commit your life to Him.” But it all starts with that first one: “Admit your sin.” Accept responsibility, and admit your guilt before God.  And then accept the only remedy there is for your sin, by throwing yourself on the mercy that God will give you through Jesus’ death on the cross.

Stop playing “The Blame Game” today; accept personal responsibility for your own sin; and then find forgiveness in Jesus. That is “What Real Faith Looks Like”!