James 5 - Eager and Beleaguered

Eager: Showing urgent desire or interest;
Beleaguered: being subjected to constant or repeated trouble or harassment.

James 5
⁷ Dear brothers and sisters, be

as you wait for the Lord’s return.
Consider the farmers who patiently wait for the rains in the fall and in the spring.
They eagerly look for the valuable harvest to ripen.
⁸ You, too, must be patient.

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courage, for the coming of the Lord is near.

⁹ Don’t grumble about each other, brothers and sisters, or you will be judged. For look—the Judge is standing at the door!

It’s striking how many people get distracted from Jesus by fixing all their attention on the people Jesus came to save from sin by focusing on the sin of the sinner rather than the Savior of the sinner and then blame Jesus for their own fixation on sinfulness of sinners. The only thing you’re holding against Jesus is His grace and mercy. Then, most audaciously, the critic, the skeptic, the ‘Deconstructionist’ thinks “THAT alone proves me right!” People are your reason for rejecting Jesus? Ridiculous! —RM

Patient like a farmer
What kind of troubles does a farmer face?

A Certain Style of Waiter. No, Not That Kind

Phil. 2 - Grumble-less
¹⁴ Do everything without complaining and arguing, ¹⁵ so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world

of crooked and perverse people.
There’s plenty to argue and complain about. Don’t.

Titus 2 NIV - Teachable
¹¹ For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people.
¹² It teaches us to say “

” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age,
¹³ while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ,
¹⁴ who gave himself for us to redeem us from

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wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.

1 Peter 4 - Focused on Our Source
⁷ The end of the world is coming soon.
Therefore, be earnest and disciplined in your prayers.
⁸ Most important of all, continue to show deep

for each other,
for love covers a multitude of sins.
⁹ Cheerfully share your home with those who need a meal or a place to stay.

Serving
¹⁰ God has given

of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts.

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them well to serve one another.
¹¹ Do you have the gift of speaking? Then speak as though God himself were speaking through you.
Do you have the gift of helping others? Do it with all the strength and energy that God supplies.
Then everything you do will bring glory to God through Jesus Christ.
All glory and power to him forever and ever! Amen.

Responsive - The gift isn’t about me.

Phil. 3 - Diligently Dependent
¹⁷ Dear brothers and sisters, pattern your lives after mine, and learn from those who follow our example.
¹⁸ For I have told you often before, and I say it again with tears in my eyes, that there are

whose conduct shows they are really enemies of the cross of Christ.
¹⁹ They are headed for destruction.
Their god is their appetite,
they brag about shameful things,
and they think only about this life here on earth.

Friendship With The World
Why are we ‘reactionary’ to Homosexual, transexuals, and pedophiles and yet have adulterers, addicts, liars, thieves and ‘gluttons’ attending church?
Adulterers, addicts - drunks and dopers, liars, thieves and gluttons do not make their sinul identity the reason for exclusion from the Biblical definition of sin. The adulterers, addicts, liars and thieves do not seek preferential reverence, applause, parades and adulation for their sin. The homosexual, transexual and pedophile DO. .

When you see and hear people rejecting the church because we call ALL of these things sin, know that this is not a case of sinners seeking salvation in the Rock of Christ. The is not sinners running to the cross for rescue and grace. This is a hostile- to- the- Cross coup. It is a war against the Gospel.

1 John 4 - Confident Contending
¹ Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit. You must test them to see if the spirit they have comes from God. For there are

false prophets in the world. ² This is how we know if they have the Spirit of God: If a person claiming to be a prophet acknowledges that Jesus Christ came in a real body, that person has the Spirit of God. ³ But if someone claims to be a prophet and does not acknowledge the

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about Jesus, that person is not from God. Such a person has the spirit of the Antichrist, which you heard is coming into the world and indeed is already here.

⁴ But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already

a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world.
⁵ Those people belong to this world, so they speak from the world’s

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, and the world listens to them.
⁶ But we belong to God, and those who know God listen to us. If they do not belong to God, they do not listen to us.
That is how we

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if someone has the Spirit of truth or the spirit of deception.

Phil. 3 - Always Eager - Eagerly Waiting
²⁰ But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior.
²¹ He will take our weak mortal bodies and change them into glorious bodies like his own, using the

power with which he will bring everything under his control.

2 Tim. 4 - Eagerly Looking Forward
⁷ I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, and I have remained faithful.
⁸ And now the prize awaits me—the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on the day of his return. And the prize is not just for me but for

who eagerly look forward to his appearing.

1 John 3 - Eagerly With Great Expectations
² Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but he has not

shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like

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, for we will see him as he really is. ³ And

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who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as he is pure.

James 5: What Kind of Waiting?
⁷ Dear brothers and sisters, be patient as you wait for the Lord’s return.
Consider the farmers who patiently wait for the rains in the fall and in the spring.
They eagerly look for the valuable harvest to ripen.
⁸ You, too, must be patient. Take courage, for the coming of the Lord is near.

EXTRAS:
2 Corinthians 4.7-18

Romans 8.31-39