I want to study with you this morning one of the major themes of the New Testament and it is a theme that could be studied from almost any book of the New Testament so I just picked one; a book in which this is the major theme.

I want to introduce this subject by talking to you about something that happened to me back when I was in my 20's. A book came out and I remember distinctly that it was a year after the book came out that I was actually reading it myself. By that time, it was such a popular book in the United States that a paper back edition had been printed. I had the paperback edition and I was down at City Hall in Grand Forks, North Dakota. I was the pastor of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in that city and I needed to make a presentation to the city council, but you know how it is if you have ever been to these city councils; there is always a whole string of business and usually you are not the first one. So I was reading my book until it was my turn to talk.

This book was a book about physical fitness. It was written by a man who had a clinic in the Dallas, Texas area and his name was Cooper. He was a physician. I had friends later who actually went to his clinic and worked with him in physical fitness. When I was at the school of health we used his protocols in giving treadmill tests. As I was reading, the thing that intrigued me the most about this book was that it was the first time in my life that I had seen physical fitness reduced to objectivity. That is, he had a point system and if you have read his works, you know what he taught at that time and probably still does. You need to get 30 points a week on his point system if you are going to be physically fit. So I was going through this trying to figure out if I was physically fit or if I should be doing something more than I was doing because I had a sedentary job; I was a pastor.

Earlier, I had been a runner in school and I was a gardener. Since I lived in North Dakota and had no power equipment, I got lots of exercise in the winter shoveling snow. I had a good-sized driveway and a walk, so I was getting some physical exercise. But as I was reading through this book, I said to myself, "I could get more physical exercise. I could be more fit than I am and not be depending so much on chance." So I started writing down on my paper some notes on different things I could do. Not too long after that I got a bicycle. In the warm season of the year I would bicycle, and in the colder season I would walk or run. When it is really cold, of course, you cannot run, you just walk. But you can get all the physical exercise you need just walking. In fact, those of you that do very much traveling, one of the reasons it is the best exercise of all is that you do not have to take equipment with you to do it. When you have gotten on an airplane and gone to some faraway city, you do not have to have your bicycle with you and you do not have to have a treadmill or all this equipment. You can just do it if you have a pair of shoes.

So I was studying this book trying to figure out if I was physically fit. And it is a wonderful thing to be physically fit, to be able to take care of yourself and to have enough energy to be able to take care of others. But a major theme of the New Testament is this concept that not only are we to be physically fit, but God wants us to be spiritually fit, morally fit. Salvation is a gift. You cannot do anything to earn it, it is a gift. But the only people that will receive this gift are those that are spiritually fit; those who are morally fit. The question I want to ask you today is, are you spiritually fit? Are you morally fit to receive the gift of salvation?

I am going to cover one short book of the Bible in which the major theme of the entire book from beginning to end is that you must be morally fit so that you can pass the judgment and be ready to receive eternal life. That is the message of the whole New Testament, by the way. We could talk about this from any one of the gospels. In the Sermon on the Mount, that was the main theme. We could study about it from Luke 21 or Matthew 24. What does it mean to be ready? It means to be spiritually or morally fit so that you can be given the gift of eternal life.

We could study about it from Ephesians 4 and 5. We studied Ephesians 4 in our Scripture lesson, about how it is God's will for you to reach the "measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ unto a perfect man". When it says a perfect man, that is not talking about whether you have perfect teeth or perfect vision. It is not talking about perfect physical fitness. It is talking about perfect spiritual or moral fitness. Ephesians 5 says that there is going to be a group of people who will not have "spot or wrinkle or any such thing". Would you like to be one of those?

Oh, friend, that is what the gospel is all about. See there are a lot of people who only understand half the gospel. The half that they understand is that all the bad things that you have done or said or thought, can be forgiven, that you can receive a pardon for all of that through the blood of Jesus. Forgiveness is wonderful, isn't it? We would be absolutely lost if Jesus had not made a way so that we could be forgiven. We receive forgiveness, it says in Ephesians 1, through His blood; through the riches of His grace we receive redemption, forgiveness of sins.

But friends, that is not all of the gospel. Jesus did not just provide a way to take care of all my terrible past, all the sins I have committed. Jesus has made provisions for the present and the future, to transform my life so that I do not have to go on living like that. The other half of the gospel is that there is grace enough, sufficient, to change my life into His image. Are those who are ready to meet Jesus when He comes, the ones whose lives have been transformed into His image?

Let's read that in the Bible. Look in 1 John 3. As time went on in the first century, all of the apostles taught that you cannot earn your way to heaven; salvation is a gift. Ephesians 2 says, "For by grace you are saved through faith." It is a gift. But some people got the wrong idea. They thought, "Since God can forgive my sins, so what if I sin today or tomorrow, He will forgive me." That is the theory of cheap grace. "Do not worry if I sin, because God will forgive it." Have you ever met somebody like that? Have you ever met somebody who says, "Well, I'll just go on and I'll sin and I'll be forgiven, but when the Lord comes I'll be forgiven and He will take me to heaven." Have you ever heard that? That is not (now I do not want to shock you too much, but I want you to think, friends), that is not New Testament Christianity. Revelation 22 makes it very clear that is not the case at all. But that is not our subject.

The gospel must do more than take away my guilt, the guilt for my past sins; the gospel must change my life. Let's read this, 1 John 3:1-3, "Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure."

So are we going to be like Him? That is what it says. If you have the hope of being like Him, what are you going to do? You are going to purify yourself as He is pure. As time went on, and there began to be some fuzzy thinking in the minds of some Christians because salvation is a gift, they lost sight of the fact that we must cooperate with the Holy Spirit and our character and our life must be changed.

We are going to the latter part of the New Testament, there were several books that go into detail about this so that it would straighten out the thinking of the Christian church concerning heresies that were coming in toward the end of the first century. 1 John was one of them. And another one, that we are going to study this morning, is the book of James in which he covers at least 20 points on this subject. You must be morally, spiritually fit if you are going to be taken to heaven, and there is grace enough to do it. He has enough grace to change your life. So there is no excuse for this not to happen. I knew when I read that book on aerobics, back in the 1960's, that there was no excuse for me not to be physically fit. There was no excuse. But I was going to have to do something to get more physically fit.

Friends, there is no excuse for you or for me to not be spiritually fit. Everyone of us can be saved, but we are going to have to do something, not to earn anything, but we must become spiritually fit to receive the gift of salvation.

Like I mentioned, several books were written toward the end of the first century by the apostles to see that Christians see this subject clearly. One of the books in which this the main theme of the entire book is spiritual fitness, so that you will pass the judgment and you will be fit to be taken to heaven, is the book that was written by the apostle James. If you have your Bible, I invite you to open to that book.

Point #1: If you want to be spiritually fit, you must be willing to endure some trials. I remember when I was in North Dakota, after I read that book, I decided that I was going to be physically fit. Sometimes it was way below zero and there was two feet of snow outside, but if I decided that I was not going to exercise until that snow went away, do you know what would happen? By the time the snow went away, I would not be physically fit anymore. That happens, by the way, to a lot of people in that part of the country. They are waiting until spring, but by spring your body is blubber because you have not walked or done anything all winter but sit at home. So I used to put on quilted underwear. I had underwear underneath and then had quilted underwear and then I had two pair of socks. In fact, I got special shoes,(I do not have those shoes anymore because I do not need them in Kansas) but I got special shoes about size 12 so that I could wear several pairs of socks in those shoes to keep my feet warm, plus rubbers, an overcoat, a scarf, hat, and gloves. Then I was ready to go walking. When it was really cold weather, when it got down to about 25 below zero, I also had one of these masks that you put on so that you look like these people who are going to hold an armed robbery; you put it over your face and just have holes for your eyes, nose, and mouth. That is a very comfortable feeling when it is about 25 below zero. Nobody thinks you are going to hold up anything because they know what the temperature is outside. Then you can go out and walk. After you have walked two or three miles a day all winter long, when spring comes, if you want to go play golf or if you want to go do something, you will be physically fit because you have not been just sitting home reading all winter long.

Friend, it is the same truth in your spiritual life. If you want to be spiritually fit, you are going to have to be willing to endure some trials. It is like if I wanted to physically fit, I had to do something. I could not say, "Well, the weather's bad today." Well, the weather might be bad tomorrow and the next month or for two or three months. So I am going to have to do something today whether the weather is bad or not. And if you want to be spiritually fit, you are going to have to endure some trials. Are you having any trials in your life?

Look at what he says about this, "My brethren, count it all joy," this is verse 2, "when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience."

What produces physical fitness? It is when you put your body to the test and you force it to do something, the result is physical fitness. The same is true spiritually. You cannot be spiritually fit unless you endure some trials and the result of enduring those trials is that you develop endurance or patience. Now, it says, "But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing." So Point #1 is that you have to be willing to endure trials.

Point #2: If you want to be spiritually fit so that you can receive the gift of salvation, He says, that you must be able to endure temptation. Do you have any temptations? Look at what it says about that in verse 12, "Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been proved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him." Is there a relationship between enduring temptation and receiving eternal life? Yes, there is. Now eternal life is a gift. God is going to give it to those who love Him. Friends, we are in a workshop down here in this world. God is getting people ready so that He can give to them eternal life. He is polishing them. He is trying them. He allows temptations to come to them. How do these temptations come? Oh, he says, they do not come from the Lord, you can read in the next verse. The temptations do not come because the Lord says, "Well, this person needs a trial today, so I am going to give him. . ." That is not the way it happens. You know where our worst trials come from? He talks about this. They come from inside. Do you have any trials that come from the inside? That is where our worst trials come from. Notice what it says, verse 14, "But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death."

So, the Bible talks about the old man, the apostle Paul calls it the old man; the carnal nature, that is, the fleshly or sinful nature inside, produces sinful desires. And if you follow those sinful desires, what is the end going to be? Death. Paul discusses that at length in Romans 6. So we have to endure temptation and not give in to it if we are going to become spiritually fit. Do you know that there are many people who are physically fit that are not spiritually fit? And some of the people who are the most physically fit are the least spiritually fit because they cannot endure temptation. Now, a physically fit person you could put them to the test, physically, and they could handle it because they are physically fit. A person that is spiritually fit, you can put them to the test and they will not give way, because they are spiritually fit. Oh, friends, how are you doing? Are you enduring temptation? That is part of becoming spiritually fit. We better hurry along.

Point #3: He tells us what we need to do so that we will be able to endure these trials, these temptations that come to us. This is in verses 19 and 20, he says, "Therefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. . ." It is all right to be as fast as you want to be in listening. That is fine, but he says watch out when you start to return an answer, do not be too quick on that. Especially, be sure that you are slow to become angry. He says in verse 20, "for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God."

Oh, friends, have you ever felt like you are in an endurance contest? You know that is really what a lot of life in this world is about. Can you endure? Let's think this through physically first, I have learned that we learn spiritual lessons by giving it a physical application and then we can see how it works. Physically, the way it works, as you put your body under stress and your body endures--that is what aerobics is all about--you do not develop an oxygen deficiency because your heart, circulatory system, and lungs have developed enough capacity so that you can produce the energy to keep you going. And if you are a runner, you know that.

You can keep going the same way spiritually. When you are under a stressful situation, can you keep going or are you going to peter out? Let me state it a different way; will you be able to maintain your patience? See the person who is spiritually fit, can maintain patience under tough situations. After those tough situations have lasted for more than five minutes, they are still patient. And so he says that if you want to develop that, if you want to become spiritually fit, learn to develop the habit of listening quick, but speaking slow; be slow to speak, slow to become angry. Endurance is one of the great things we seek for when we are seeking physical fitness. I remember it was not too long after that time in North Dakota that I got my first ten-speed bicycle. And was that ever a pleasure to ride! I remember once, a short time after I had gotten it, I had been running and walking, I took that bicycle for a 24 or 25 mile ride, it took about two hours and it was wonderful. I tell you, life, physically, is so much more pleasurable when you have perfect physical fitness; and life, spiritually, is so much more pleasurable when you have perfect spiritual fitness.

Friends, we must have this because if you are given the gift of salvation you are going to be taken to live with the angels. Are you fit spiritually to live with angels? Maybe we will talk a little bit more about the angels in a few minutes because being fit to live with angels is an exciting subject to talk about and to think about.

Point #4: If I am going to be spiritually fit, I must become gentle. Now the word that is translated in the Bible is meekness; it means gentleness. Actually meekness means two things. It means to be humble and to be gentle. It says that in verse 21, "Therefore, lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness [that is gentleness] the implanted word, which is able to save your souls." Now gentleness is a big subject. If you think it through, in your own home, anybody would prefer to live with somebody who is gentle than with somebody who is not gentle. Now I think that is universal. I have never met anybody who has said, "No, I wouldn't like to live with a gentle person. I'd like to live with somebody who is rough and harsh." I have never met anybody like that.

Gentleness is a quality of spiritual fitness. The person who is spiritually fit to live with angels is a gentle person. Jesus said, "Come unto Me all you who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me, for I am [gentle] and lowly of heart and you will find rest unto your souls."

You see, it produces tranquillity, rest of soul. Heaven is a place where people have rest of soul; there is no strife there. Gentleness is a factor, a big factor, of spiritual fitness and nobody is spiritually or morally fit to go to heaven who is not a gentle person. That is something that we need to remind ourselves of often. Every time you come across the word meek or meekness in the New Testament remember that one of the primary meanings of that word is that it is talking about gentleness. It is the meek, the gentle people, Jesus said, who will inherit the earth.

Point #5: We must not only know what the Word says, (this is in verses 22 and onward) but we must actually become active in doing what the Word of God says. Do you remember when Jesus met the devil, Jesus said to the devil, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but. . ." what? "By every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God." Matthew 4:4. And so James is talking about this here. He is talking to people that go to church. Now there are people in Wichita who never go to church. They do not even know what the Word says. But there are some people who come to church and when they come to church they hear what the Bible says. They hear it, they are hearers. If you are here today, you are listening to the Word of God, because that is what we are studying. So you are a hearer for sure, if you are here. But James says that is not enough. Look at what he says, "But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the word, this one will be blessed in what he does."

So it is not enough to come to church and to find out what the Bible says. Now that is good, but after you know what it says, you have to actually do what it says. I cannot just talk about being gentle, I have to actually become a gentle person. My wife, my children, the people I work with, must find out that I am a gentle person; I must actually act that way. I must not be just a hearer and hear about it, I must actually do it. There is enough grace, friends, that is what grace is all about; Jesus has enough grace. Remember He said to Paul, "My grace is sufficient for you." He has enough grace to enable you to actually do what the Word says. This is a big subject in the book of James that I must not only know what the truth says, I must live it out. We will come back to that in a moment.

Point #6: This is one of the major subjects of the book of James and that has to do with the tongue. If I am going to gain spiritual fitness, moral fitness, so that I can be taken to heaven, my tongue, the way I speak, must be transformed. Let's see what it says, James 1:26, "If anyone among you thinks he is religious, and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this one's religion is useless." [vain or useless; not worth anything]

When you were a child did you ever play games with play money, counterfeit money? A couple of days ago my father and I were in a town in northern Oklahoma and we were on our way back home to Wichita. It was the middle of the day and we would not get back here until late afternoon so we stopped to eat lunch at a cafeteria in a big shopping center. As we walked we saw a very interesting little display they had in the hall. It was interesting because there were so many things of a religious nature there. There were T-shirts with verses of the Bible written on them and very interesting displays of a religious nature on T-shirts and other items. But one of the things that I noticed was a necktie and this necktie had pictures of various moneys on it; five hundred dollar bills, fifty dollar bills, twenty dollar bills. There was probably about a thousand dollars' worth of bills on that necktie, but you could not buy anything with that; it was just a picture. James says if you go to church and you find out what the truth is and you hear what the Bible says and you know what the truth is, but you cannot control the way you speak, your religion is not worth anything.

Ellen White made some interesting comments about this and I would like to read just one of these to you. It is about angels. "The angels never fly into a passion, never are envious, selfish and jealous, no harsh and unkind words escape their lips." In Heavenly Places, 180. Oh, friends, are you ready to go and live with angels? There are millions up there. Are you ready to go up there and live with them? How do they talk? Do they ever talk harsh? No. Do they ever say something that is not kind? No. Well, are you ready to go with them? Or, would your speech spoil it; would it not quite be heaven anymore if you started to talk? Now listen, if we are going to have a spiritual fitness or a moral fitness to go to heaven, we are not going to get it after we go up there; we are going to get it down here. Now that is New Testament Christianity. There is no place up in heaven where you can take the alcoholic and say, "Now we're going to put you through a program so that you can learn to quit drinking." There is no place like that up there. They do not have any reform schools up there. If I am going to be reformed, if I am going to become spiritually fit, I have to do it down here. The Bible says that no drunkard will go up there. You can read that in 1 Corinthians 6:9, 10. So if my problem is drinking, what do I have to do? I have to overcome that down here because if I do not overcome it down here, I am never going up there. They have no program up there to help me overcome my drinking. The people up there do not drink and there is none around. You know what I mean, I am talking about alcohol.

So, I must be reformed, I must become spiritually and morally fit down here and James said if I profess Christianity, if I profess religion, but it does not change the way I talk, it is like counterfeit money. My religion is not worth anything. That is what he says in James 1:26. In fact, he devotes a good part of the third chapter of his letter to this very subject. Look in James 3, now this is the way that you can tell if you are spiritually, morally fit so that you can be taken to heaven. This is the way you can tell. Look, James 3:2, "For we all stumble in many things. If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body." When I come to the place that my speech is perfect, I am ready to be taken to heaven; I am spiritually fit; I am morally fit. Now when I am talking about perfect speech I am not talking about the grammar, you understand that, don't you? I think we should attempt to use correct grammar always, but I am not talking about the grammar, I am talking about harshness, unkindness, anger, impurity, or untruthful speech.

See, the angels never tell a lie. They never tell you something that is not true. They never say anything that is not pure or that is not kind or that is harsh. And if you and I are going to be ready to go and live with them, our speech must be changed. Notice what he says here, he talks about this all the way down through verse 12 in chapter 3. Notice in verse 5, "Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell." That is what the tongue is he says. Your tongue gets you in trouble. Has your tongue ever gotten you in trouble? It is set on fire by hell, he says. It sets on fire the whole course of nature. Is that true? That is true. Lots of wars, probably the majority of wars, began because of something that somebody said or a group of people said. Divorce is often caused by the tongue. All manner of problems where we work, where we live, with our families and people we know, come from the tongue. In fact, it is so unruly notice what he says in verse 8, "But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison." Nobody can control your tongue unless the grace of Christ is in your life. Because it says no human being can do it. No human being can control my tongue. I cannot and nobody else can; only the grace of God can.

But that is what is involved in moral fitness, spiritual fitness. And I want to tell you something, friends, I want to challenge you to do an experiment with the Lord. Say, "Lord, You know what I need to change in my speech and I want Your grace to come into my life. I'm yielding my life to You and I want Your grace to come into my life and to help me to speak the way You want me to speak." I want to tell you, friends, if we would pray that prayer and be in earnest and start practicing, you know there are lots of families that are about to split up and there are lots of people who are in all kinds of trouble in their work and lots of people in all kinds of trouble in their family, they could almost have a little heaven on earth in just a few days if they would change the way they speak. The Lord wants to give you the ability to do it. Now no man can do it. He says, "no man can tame the tongue." It is impossible. It is full of deadly poison. But Jesus wants to give you the grace, the power, to change the way that you speak. See this is New Testament Christianity. This is not just profession. James says that if you are just making a profession and not doing anything, your religion is worth nothing. It actually has to do something in your life like change the way you speak.

He says, concerning the tongue, verse 9, "With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so." The tongue, that is #6. We mentioned in #5, he talks about the kind of conduct we should have in verses 13-18 in chapter 3.

Point #7: James 1:27, "Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world." Now in the social situation in which he was writing to these people, the people in their society that were in the greatest difficulty financially, and in other ways, were orphans and widows. They had no social security. They had no old-age pension. They had no government programs. And what was worse than that, in their society, it was very difficult for women to find employment. Now we live in a different society and a different age, a different time, but it was very difficult for women to find employment. That was one of the reasons that prostitution became a big business. Women became prostitutes in an effort to try to survive.

And orphans also had a problem with employment, young people who had no training or skills. These are people who are in financial difficulty. James says that if you are really a Christian, if you really have "pure and undefiled religion", you are going to look around and find the people who are in trouble, the people that need food, clothing, that need help and you are going to help them. You are not going to just let them go. That is what religion is all about. He goes in to that more and more in chapter 2, how that we need to help the people who need help. We need to actually love our neighbor as ourselves, without partiality. That is point #8.

Point #8: Partiality. Now that is a huge subject--partiality. He makes a big point of it, too, in chapter 2. We are not to be partial. We are to love every human being and try to help everyone that we can.

Point #9: "Love your neighbor as yourself." James 2:8. If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself," you do well. If you love your neighbor as yourself, you are going to have eternal life. Did you know that? If you love your neighbor as yourself, you are going to have eternal life. Not that you have earned it, you are going to be given it as a gift. Jesus is going to give it to you. Is salvation complicated? You see, if you love your neighbor as yourself, your neighbor, a human being the Bible says is created in the image of God. The apostle John says that if you do not love your neighbor, your brother whom you can see, then you cannot love God whom you cannot see. The way you learn how to love God and do His will is to love your neighbor as yourself. That is a test you can apply to yourself and say, "Am I morally fit? Do I have spiritual fitness?"

Point #10: You are going to be judged by the law of liberty. That is James 2:10 and 12. So do not let down on some point. He goes into that in James 2 also. He says in verse 10, "For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all." We learn that in physical fitness. I took a class back in graduate school in the area of physical fitness. One of the things we learned in physical fitness is that if you are really going to be physically fit, you have to develop all the muscles of the body. You cannot just do curls all the time and develop your biceps. That is not physically fit. To be really physically fit you have to develop the heart muscle, the diaphragm, the lungs, and all the skeletal muscles of the body; you have to develop them all. It is the same thing with spiritual fitness. He talks about that in James 2:10. You cannot say, "Well, I keep all the law except for one point. I keep nine of the commandments, but I do not keep one." He says that is not good enough. You are not spiritually fit if there is one that you are breaking.

Point #11: It says in James 2:13, "For judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment." I want to ask you a question. Do you want to receive the mercy of God, the forgiveness of God? You do, don't you? Jesus said, "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain [receive] mercy." If you want to receive mercy from God, you need to give mercy to others. Let me ask you this question. Some of you are not going to enjoy this so brace yourself. When is your opportunity to exercise mercy? Are you ready for this? Your opportunity to exercise mercy is when somebody else really blows it and they make a whopper of a mistake. You see, if everybody all around you was always perfect, would you ever need to exercise mercy? But has God allowed you to get into situations where you know that the people all around you were not perfect? It is when you are around people who make mistakes that you have an opportunity to exercise mercy. That is your chance. By the way, when you get to heaven you will have no opportunity to exercise mercy anymore. Everybody up there will be perfect. If you are going to learn about mercy, you are going to have to learn about it down here. Now is your golden opportunity. Right? Now is your chance. If you are living with or working with people, or around people that are blowing it all the time and are making all kinds of mistakes, that is your opportunity to develop mercy. If we want to obtain mercy, we must be merciful.

Point #12: We must not just have faith, but our faith must work. That is discussed in detail in verses 14-26 in chapter 2. I want to go immediately to Point #13.

Point #13: In James 4 he is talking to some people who profess Christianity and yet they are having strife. Now I want to ask you, friend, do you see any strife in the Christian world today? There is a lot of strife today. Do you know where strife comes from? It is the result of pride. He makes that very, very clear in James 4:1-6. Pride produces strife. He says in verse 6, "God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble." So if I want to be spiritually fit, morally fit, I must be striving for humility. And how do I get this humility, this humbleness, that I must have if I am going to be spiritually or morally fit? Well, here is how you get it in verses 7-10.

Point #14: How to get humility, "Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and He will lift you up." Make a decision and say, "Lord, I'm choosing to humble myself before you. I'm not going to be proud." Do you know what, friends, do you know in Christian churches, in homes, in families, where we work, if every single person would practice this and become humble, do you know that strife would just vanish. That does not mean we would not have problems, but we would not have strife as we try to deal with the problems. Pride produces strife and in heaven they do not have wars, strife, quarreling, grumbling, and trouble because everybody is humble. Nobody that is proud is going to go there. The Bible says that all the proud are going to burn up some day. (See Malachi 4:1.) I must humble my heart, saying, "Lord, help me to have perfect humility." Oh, friend, it will change your family, your marriage, and where you work.

Point #15: If you want to be morally fit, spiritually fit stop talking evil about your brother or your sister or somebody else around. "Oh but," you say, "it's true." Oh, yes, it is. There are a lot of things that are true that we could say about each other that we would not have to say. Notice what he says here in verse 11, "Do not speak evil of one another, brethren."

"Oh but," you say, "he is evil." Well, he may be. The more you talk about it the worse it is going to be for the both of you. Do not speak evil about your neighbor. That is part of being spiritually fit. By the way, if you want to read something interesting about that, you study the life of Jesus and watch all the different times where He restrained Himself from saying what He could have said. It is a very interesting study.

Point #16: Now this is going to be painful to some people. I hope it is not to you, but if it is, it is just something you need to overcome. James says that if you want to be spiritually fit, morally fit, do not be a bragger or a boaster. Now for some people that is not a problem, but for some it is a problem. The New Testament teaches that a Christian does not boast. Love does not boast, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13. In James 4:16, he says this boasting is evil. Do not be a bragger or a boaster. By the way, that is something else that is very interesting to study. When you study the life of Christ, you will not find any bragging or boasting. And of all people that could have boasted, He could have done it, but He did not.

Point #17: Do we ever deliberately hurt our brother or our sister in a hard spot? Or just watch them in a hard spot and not try to do anything to help them? I know I have heard it said that when somebody made a big mistake, got themselves in trouble, I have heard people say something like this, "Well, I'm sorry they are in trouble, but it's their own fault." Have you ever heard that? "Sorry they're in trouble, but it's their own fault. Just let them wallow in it. They'll have to figure their own problem out." Notice what he says about this in James 5. He talks about people with money and because they have money and power, they oppress those who are poor and he says that if you do this, you will be condemned in the day of judgment. You are not morally or spiritually fit. They do not do that up in heaven. The powerful do not oppress the weaker.

By the way, when we first go to heaven, are there going to be babies and children there? Many, many, many. But there will be no one who is going to oppress them. There will be no one who will oppress the weak. He talks about that in detail here in James 5:1-6.

Point #18: We are to be patient and persevering as we are going through this growing process. Have you ever met somebody who says, "Well, I just wish that the Lord could come and end this world." or "I wish that I could just die and get out of this place." Probably a lot of people have felt that way at some point in their lives. Well, I know that in my past life I can look back at certain times that I know God has preserved my life because I know of times when it would have been the easiest thing in the world for me to die. I have been as close to death as you can be and not to die. Well, then, why did I live? Because God wanted to do something more on my character to get me more spiritually fit, more morally fit. Has God preserved your life because He wants to make you more spiritually or morally fit so that He can give you eternal life?

Have you ever heard the saying, "Only the good die young"? Now that is not totally true. But there are a lot of people, if we had time I could show it to you from inspired writings, but we are not going to take the time. There are a lot of people that are alive today because God has preserved their life from injury, accident, or sickness. God has preserved them from dying because in the past, if they had died, they would have been lost and God lengthened their probation so that they could have a chance to be saved. Be patient because God is working out something in your life. Maybe God has preserved your life until now because He wants to make you morally and spiritually fit like you were not in the past so He can give you eternal life. Oh, life is solemn and life is serious when you realize what the New Testament really teaches.

Point #19: It has to do with what we speak again, in James 5:12, "But above all, my brethren, do not swear." The very thing that the Bible emphasizes over and over again is something that people do unconsciously, almost without thinking. Some people can hardly say a sentence without swearing. The Bible says not to swear. They do not swear up there.

Point #20: James 5:16, "Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much."

Oh, friend, I wonder if there is anybody here that in your heart God has put within you a desire to be spiritually healed and to be fit, spiritually and morally, for heaven. Do you want to go to that place? Do you want to be ready so that you will talk the way they talk up there? So that you will act and live the way they live up there? So that you can go there and have eternal life in a perfect place where all the pain, sorrow, sin, and degradation of this world will be gone forever? Oh, he said to pray for each other; confess your trespasses to one another; get things made right; do not have things between you. Get things made right and pray for each other so that you may be healed.

Would you like to do that this morning? You know my brother, Marshall, understood this concept that if you want to be saved, you have to be spiritually fit, you have to be morally fit. That is a New Testament teaching. We looked at it in just one book. I told you that you could study this subject from almost every single book in the New Testament. In fact, I do not know of one that you could not study this subject from. That is how important it is. But just a few weeks before my brother died, he took a popular song, a popular religious song, and he rewrote some of the words about being fit, morally, spiritually fit. I've asked Judy Albright to sing this song. We sang this song at our camp meeting in 1991 and 1992 and I have asked Judy if she would sing it again for us. I want you to think of what these words mean. It is what we have been studying about. It is about being morally fit, about being spiritually fit within so that we can be taken up there.

Oh, friend, is it your decision to not only long for, but to prepare for home? Are you going to be ready? Are you going to be spiritually fit so that you can be taken to heaven? If that is your decision and you want to tell the Lord, I want you to kneel with me and let's pray so that we will be ready, be spiritually fit.