How to Think About Your Future
Sermon series: The Book of James
August 8, 2021
Pastor Phil Chorlian
Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” 14 Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15 Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil. 17 If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them. – James 4:13-17
Three mistakes we make:
I. Planning
Now listen, you who say, `Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business, and make money. —James 4:13
The Solution: Remember God in
In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps. —Proverbs 16:9
II. Presuming about
Why, you don’t even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil. —James 4:14-16
The Solution: Trust God for
Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. —Matthew 6:34
Lord, my days are in your hands. —Psalm 35:15
III. Living for the
If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them. —James 4:17
The Solution: Live on
“The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.” —Mark Twain
Then the man who had received one bag of gold came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. 25 So I was afraid and went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.’ 26 “His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? 27 Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest. 28 “‘So take the bag of gold from him and give it to the one who has ten bags. 29 For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them. —Matthew 25:24-29