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James opens his epistle by reaching through the pages of the sacred text and slapping his reader's faces. It is not a slap that you should take as an insult or interpret as an act of aggression. Instead it is one that you would more than likely say, "Thank you, I needed that" the moment the sting begins to fade. It is a slap intended to wake the reader up and provide a fresh perspective.

There is no coddling here, no niceties, just good ole, old-fashioned straight talk. In the opening verses of chapter 1, James is a spiritual chiropractor, giving his readers an "attitude adjustment." He begins by adjusting our attitude about trials.

Look at James 1:2-4: "Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, [3] knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. [4] And let endurance have its perfect result, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing."

Consider it all joy? You may be thinking, "Give me a break. Does James really think trials are joyful?" Yes, that is exactly what he wrote. Now he didn't say, "Consider yourself lucky, or hey, don't trials make you happy?" He wrote, "Consider it all joy." There is a difference. Joy is a calmness that runs beneath life's storms, it is a delight that stills the heart and anchors the soul.

Why can you have "calm delight" when trials come? Because in those trials, God is making you into his masterpiece.

Have you ever had your dreams shattered? Have you wondered where God was when life became too much to bear? Have you ever thought that if you had more in life you would get more out of life?

In his book, Shattered Dreams, Larry Crabb wrote: "Satan's masterpiece is not the prostitute or the skid-row bum. It is the self-sufficient person who has made life comfortable, who is adjusting well to the world and truly likes living here, a person who dreams of no better place to live, who longs only to be a little better--and a little better off--than he already is." (Fresh Illustrations http://www.freshministry.org/illustrations.html)

If Satan's masterpiece is a self-sufficient person, then God's masterpiece is a "God-dependant person." When it comes to spiritual things, we are all bankrupt before the Father. People who have true joy are God-dependant, not self-sufficient. They yearn for a better relationship with Him through difficult times and find their joy in that relationship, not the fulfillment of their dreams.

Please notice that verse two doesn't say, "if you encounter various trials," it says, "when!" No one is immune from hardships. Not even you. Not even me.

James teaches us to have "calm delight" when we encounter trials. Now that's a fresh perspective. Instead of mumbling about our trials, we enjoy a calm delight, even in the face of hardship. But James isn't finished with us yet. In verses 5-8 he admonishes his readers to be single minded, not double-minded-he calls on us to have a wise perspective.

James 1:5-8 "But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all men generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. [6] But let him ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. [7] For let not that man expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, [8] being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways."

If people easily confuse happiness and joy, they also easily miss the distinction between wisdom and knowledge. We live in an information age. With the click of a mouse key and a good search engine, I can get information in just about any field. But there is a huge difference between having access to information and living wisely. 

Solomon's name is synonymous with wisdom. Where did he get his "discerning heart?"

1 Kings 4:29 answers that question. "God gave Solomon wisdom and very great insight, and a breadth of understanding as measureless as the sand on the seashore." Why did God give him wisdom? Because he asked for it. (I Kings 3:9)

James explains that to receive wisdom, the petitioner must ask in faith, and be single-minded, not the kind of person that is controlled by doubts. What kind of faith do you have? A firm faith, or a wind-tossed faith?

Verses 9-11 provide another fresh perspective, this time, James asks his readers to view their life from an eternal perspective, instead of a temporal one.

"But let the brother of humble circumstances glory in his high position; [10] and let the rich man glory in his humiliation, because like flowering grass he will pass away. [11] For the sun rises with a scorching wind, and withers the grass; and its flower falls off, and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed; so too the rich man in the midst of his pursuits will fade away." (James 1:9-11)

Time has a way of changing our perspective. In the early 1940's Ruth Gruber was working, on behalf of the government, to promote the Alaskan territory to homesteaders. She traveled by truck, dogsled, and when she was lucky, by plane. 

In 1942, she was about to board a plane headed for Nome, when she received a message from the Secretary of the Interior. This was before the day of satellite pagers-it wasn't an instant message-the telegraph operator had to decode it for her. The bush pilot became impatient and told her he couldn't wait any longer, the plane would have to leave without her.

Gruber was in a bind, she couldn't walk away from a message from the Secretary of the Interior, she had to wait. I'm sure she wasn't happy to miss her flight and to have to arrange other transportation to Nome. The impatient pilot couldn't wait just a few more minutes, which ended up saving her life. Soon after taking off, the plane crashed into a mountain, killing everyone on board. (Fresh Illustrations http://www.freshministry.org/illustrations.html)

For a while, Gruber was wishing the operator would hurry up. Later, she was glad he didn't.

If time can change our perspective like that, what does eternity do? Wealth, status, position-they all become unimportant when viewed through the perspective of eternity.
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