Day 4 James Life "A Letter to the People" Part2

Day 4 James Life “ A Letter to the people, part 2”

Last Week Question: What would you have done if you’d been forced to leave your home and live in a foreign country?

1. What are you feeling? What are you thinking? What options do you have? How would you describe your feelings toward God during that experience?

-Anger. Fear. Confusion. Grief. The Jews had a few choices. They could continue to rely on their faith and other ancestors-they could keep hope alive and believe one day God would bring them back to their homes and their family and back to the promise land. 

OR they can choose to rebel against their captors and find themselves killed OR just blend in.

Read Daniel 1:1-8 Daniel was a teenager who was faced with a very similar choice.

????What was to happen to the Jews from the royal family and nobility?

??? What were they to learn?

???What did Daniel decide to do according to vs 8? Resolve-means to be committed to a course of action, he was determined to do what is right

-Daniel was drafted as a counselor to King Nebuchadnezzar and interpreted 2 of the kings dreams- Daniel’s friends were rescued from the fiery furnace and Daniel from a lions den

vs. 8-Daniel chose not to eat the meat(pork) against Jewish culture is an example of someone who chose not to fit in with the foreign culture including their gods

-We are just like the Jewish people scattered across the globe. They had to choose between Faith vs. comfort. They struggled to keep their identity as a nation as Gods Own people---and so do we as followers of Christ.

            -by the time jesus died and rose again, there were the same amount of jews living outside of Palestine as they live inside. In every city Paul visited on his missionary journeys he found a Jewish synagogue. God works things together for his good (rom 8:28) the transport of people from their home to other countries helped spread the gospel.

-God wants you to be the light in the dark world. This is not our home, heaven is our home. You have the choice not to accept gods of our culture and the pressures of life: money-what you have in your heart not in your bank account matters to God and endures for eternity, popularity-people pleaser or are you pleasing God, beauty- Proverbs 31:30 Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised., self-satisfaction, instant gratification, and sex and drugs than waiting for the one person God intended you to be with-settling for Mr. Right Now than Mr. Right.

-You can choose to blend in and look like everyone else adopting the customs, or you can have higher standards. And accept “being ordinary  Christian is not enough” You can become less of what God designed you to be or fulfill the purpose that far exceeds anything this world can offer. A life with God is better than anything you can find outside of Him.

Going back to James 2:1*** Why in the world would James call these Jewish Christians “ the twelve tribes?” And how do we know James was even writing to Christians/

Read James 2:1
          
           -What did James call the people to who he was writing?
         
           -He calls them “brothers” and “believers in Jesus”
        
           -Why not call them saints or beloved or new creations ? instead of the 12 twelve tribes.
       
    Remember the 1^st century Jew did not have a youth ministry, choir, a pastor or a building. Being a Jew brought a sense of identity a shared community but if you were a new who chose to believe in Jesus as the Messiah, where did they leave you? James brought up the 12 tribes as a way to remind the people that they still had a history, they shared a common story of faith that started in Abraham but was fulfilled in Jesus Christ They needed to be reminded they were family (and when you’re a Jewish Christian living across the world) every member matters.

We are just like the early Christians, we disagreed, showed favoritism, argued, let our speech go in the wrong direction, tempted by the devil.

Hebrews 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us..

Just as the Jewish people shared a common heritage-a shared story that could be told across centuries-you have a shared history , too. As a believer there are millions of faithful followers who have walked this journey of faith throughout history. You may feel alone-much like those early Christians felt-but you are not. You are part of an eternal family. We are running this race .