The Book of James: "Living Like the Church: The Long Haul"

February 25, 2024

Associate Pastor Louise Waller

 

James 1:1-4

Trials of many kinds

 …To Test Our Faith

Hebrews 12:1-3

“…Let us run with…"

"Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when you get diagnosed with cancer or when you have
to declare bankruptcy or when you just lost your job or when you just got served
divorce papers. How we think about tests and challenges will determine the outcome
they produce in our lives. Tests and challenges can utterly ruin people or renovate them.
We are not to be broken by the trials but broken by God in the midst of trials. To be
broken by God means to be healed of our sick and willful ways of dealing with life. To be
broken by God means to finally come to the place where we can admit that we do not
have what it takes; that we have exhausted our resources, are at the end of our rope,
and that we are poor in spirit. It means to finally be brought to the place where we are
ready for an entirely new way of living life—God’s way, filled with God’s power,
moment by moment. This is how our faith is perfected."  -J.D. Walt

Reward: Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness,
Gentleness, Self-Control

1 Peter 1:3-7

 

(NIV)