James 3:13-18

¹³ Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you? let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom. ¹⁴ But if ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not, and lie not against the truth. ¹⁵ This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish. ¹⁶ For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work. ¹⁷ But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy. ¹⁸ And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace.

What is wisdom? Often, we use words in our Christian context and assume that everyone has the same working definition of the word. You’ve probably heard that wisdom is knowing what to do and how to do it; wisdom is experience; wisdom is knowing God’s will; or some combination of those understandings. While none of those are wrong, they perhaps fail to capture the essence of what wisdom is in Scripture and how the word is used. So, what is wisdom? We are told that the “fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: and knowledge of the holy is understanding” (Proverbs 9:10). In light of that understanding, J.I. Packer gives us a good working definition of wisdom in Scripture. He says, “Wisdom is, in fact, the practical side of moral goodness.” Further, A.W. Tozer wrote, “wisdom is always associated with righteousness and humility and is never found apart from godliness and true holiness of life.” Wisdom, then, is submission and obedience to God and the emulation of God’s character and will in the life of a believer. James speaks to the heart of the issues the Christians he wrote to were facing. How they faced trials, whether they were obedient, how they treated one another, and how they used their tongues were all rooted in whether or not their hearts were submitted to God and exhibited His wisdom. This week, we will talk about true wisdom. James teaches us that true wisdom, God’s wisdom, is marked by godly living, godly motives, godly fruits, and godly attitudes. This week, we will examine the first two of those qualities.

First, true wisdom is marked by godly living. James puts forward a rhetorical question that he will then answer. “Whose is wise and endued with knowledge among you?” “Endued with knowledge” refers to someone with understanding, skill, or an expert in a craft. Here, it refers to a spiritually mature person. The answer is found in what we do. “Let him show” is James’s instruction. Just as one’s faith is demonstrated in works, so is wisdom. “Good conversation” means “good behavior” or “good living.” Combined with “works” (deeds and activities) it describes the pattern of a person’s life. Wisdom is not someone who has been around a long time. It is not necessarily someone who has a lot of experience. Experience can be very valuable if it is good experience, but it can also be dangerous if it is misled experience or bad experience. The key is found in the next part of this verse: “with meekness of wisdom.” “Meekness” and “wisdom” are here used as synonyms.  Jesus described Himself as “meek and lowly in heart” (Matthew 11:29). Proverbs 11:2 says, “with the lowly (humble) is wisdom.” Meekness and humility are the definitions of wisdom. If our “wisdom” leads us to pride or self-advancement of any kind, it is not godly wisdom. “Meekness” and humility are not marks of weakness. Instead they are marks of true spiritual maturity. They are produced in the life of a believer by the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23). One of the men that God used greatly in Scripture, Moses, was described as “very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth” (Numbers 12:3). True wisdom is first demonstrated in humble, meek, and godly living.

Next, true wisdom is manifested in godly motives. James gets to the heart of the issue. Our wisdom that we exhibit comes from one of two sources. It either comes from God and is the product of humility and meekness in godly living that He produces in our lives or it comes from the world, the flesh, and the devil. Those three great enemies of the believer are found in verse 15 as “earthly, sensual, devilish.” “Earthly” describes the world system and its way of doing things. “Sensual” describes the senses or the “lusts of the flesh” (Ephesians 2:3). “Devilish” refers to the devil himself. These three are all a part of this fallen world that is passing away (1 John 2:15-17) and the Bible tells us further that the whole world “lieth in wickedness (literally, the wicked one)” (1 John 5:19). Verse fourteen tells us how we can identify what comes from these three sources. Wisdom from the world, the flesh, and the devil is rooted in “bitter envying and strife” that resides in the “hearts” of people. “Bitter envying” describes intense jealousy rooted in a desire to exalt and please self. The word for “strife” here is a word referring to “selfish ambition.” These find their origin in the devil who was cast out of heaven for desiring God’s throne and glory (Isaiah 14:12-14; Ezekiel 28:12-19). That same ambition exists in the heart of fallen man and is a constant temptation facing us as human beings. Everything in the world system and in our flesh tells us to exalt self. To consistently live our lives this way exhibits that we “lie…against the truth.” The phrase essentially means we betray the gospel with our actions. The gospel calls us to self-denial, never to exalt self (Luke 9:23-27). John MacArthur summarizes the issue as it pertains to Christians exhibiting this behavior in the local church saying, ““Those whose lives are based on and motivated by human, ungodly wisdom are inevitably self-centered, living in a world in which their own personal ideas, desires, and standards are the measure of everything. Whatever and whoever serves those ends is considered good and friendly; whatever and whoever threatens those ends is considered bad and an enemy. Those who are engulfed in self-serving worldly wisdom resent anyone or anything that comes between them and their own objectives.”

Based on these first two characteristics of true wisdom, are our lives marked by meekness, humility, and godly living or selfish ambition? We may take up the banner of a righteous cause. We may say outwardly that our desire is to please God, but can we honestly take inventory of our lives or our service for Jesus and say that what we do is done in humble submission to Him? Or, would we honestly have to say that we are driven more by self-glorification and selfish ambition? What kind of wisdom does your life exhibit?