Boasting In Our Arrogance

“But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.” (James 4:16-17)

The man who “boasts in his arrogance” is like the popular mountebank portrayed in old Western movies.  You know the character: he’s the fellow who has a cart full of various elixirs, nostrums, and potions.  He jumps up on a soapbox and begins to boast about how he can cure this and fix that.  And he can do nothing of the sort.  He’s a charlatan.

But we are no different when we “boast in our arrogance,” planning the business trip without bathing it in prayer, seeking companionship without seeking God first, or preparing for a career without ever considering how God may be glorified in it.  “All such boasting,” warns James, “is evil.”

So James concludes: “Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.”  He is addressing what is frequently called a sin of omission.  Most of us are aware of sins of commission, deliberate sins, the active doing of something we know to be wrong.  

Sins of omission, on the other hand, are those occasions where we remain passive, leaving undone the things we ought to do.  To quote James again: “to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.”

Given the immediate context James is saying, “If you fail to humble yourselves and you continue to speak and act presumptuously, leaving God out of your thinking and planning, you have sinned.”  

Life consists of uncertainty and is characterized by frailty.  Therefore, life calls for humility.

Let us conclude our study by asking a practical question: “Given what James teaches in these verses, how can I practice humility this week?”  Consider three ways:

1) You are weak and fragile, so trust God with your life

Remember that you depend upon Him for everything.  Everything!  Food, clothing, shelter, rest.  Our lives are a vapor, a mist, here for a moment and gone.  We must depend upon God for everything.  

2) You don’t know everything, so trust God with your plans

Remember James warns: “You do not know what will happen tomorrow.”  Be humble: You don’t know everything.  You don’t know the future.  

Remember that not knowing the future is as much a mercy of God as a mystery of God.  God knows what we can handle and when we can handle it.  He knows whether to give or withhold information.  He is always working, growing us and conforming us to greater Christlikeness.  God knows best and always acts rightly.  

So don’t worry about the future and trust God with your plans.

3) You can’t keep breathing forever, so trust God with your soul

This is a clear and blunt conclusion given James’ teaching in these verses.  Because our lives are like the evaporating steam rising from our morning coffee, we ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live…”

Ultimately, God alone keeps us living.  Ultimately, God alone keeps us breathing.  How foolish we are if we do not trust Him with our soul and live for His glory.

I saw an image once in an online article that gripped me.  The story was about efforts to revive someone whose heart had stopped beating.  What struck me was the image: a couple of doctors or nurses standing over a man who was lying motionless on a gurney.  One of the doctors was holding defibrillator paddles above the patient as though he had just tried to shock the patient’s heart into beating again.  

What was so gripping about the image was the look on the faces of the doctors as they stood over the patient.  They stood motionless, their eyes fastened to the heart monitor, waiting to see whether the man’s heart would start beating.  Their frozen posture indicated that they had done all that was humanly possible to revive the man.  There was nothing more they could do except watch to see whether the man’s heart would beat again.

That image is a memorable reminder that ultimately God alone keeps us living and breathing.

Many of us grew up praying a certain bedtime prayer.  The words have changed a bit over time.  We now teach our children to pray it this way:

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
Guide me safely through the night,
and wake me with the morning light.
It’s not a bad prayer.  I used it myself when raising my boys.  But as I’ve grown older I have gained a greater appreciation for the prayer I was taught when I was small:

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
And If I die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.

I think that prayer is more honest, more humble in its petition.  I believe it conveys a far better understanding of, and appreciation for, the God who is sovereign over the affairs of men—including His sovereignty over our very souls.

You are not going to go on breathing forever, so trust your soul to God.

What About You?

• What part does God play in your plans for the upcoming week?
• How can you use this passage when sharing the gospel?
• How many sins of omission did you commit last week?  Last hour?  What does this teach about the human condition and our need for a Savior?

**Excerpt from You’re Either Walking The Walk Or Just Running Your Mouth (Preaching Truth: 2020), pages 154-158, available in all formats here.