Establish your hearts
Establish your hearts. What does that mean and how can we live it?
We’re looking at James 5:8 among other gems in the Bible today. So, join us, as we break it down, read the context, and see how the beauty of God’s Word changes our lives.
Having an Evergreen Relationship with God is a time for women and teen girls to seek the one thing that can’t be taken away from us—God’s Words—and to let it light our path, so we can be with God all the days of our lives and purposefully live our lives for him.
So let’s break it down:
Establishing our hearts. It sounds so beautiful! To establish ourselves like an unmovable element of nature or any grand architecture that has withstood weather and time over centuries. But what about our hearts? That seems a little harder to visualize or to even start seeing how we can actually make it happen. Our hearts are talked about often in the Bible as the deepest part of who we are, where we ultimately decide to go chase evil or choose good.
When God sent the flood, Genesis 6:5 says it was because he saw not only the hearts of those on earth, but the intention of the thoughts of their heart. That’s pretty deep! It’s almost a precursor to the precursor. It starts with an intention of a thought, and then the thought of our hearts, and then our hearts lead us to take action.
It almost matches the flow in James 1:14-15—that we each person faces temptations, then lured by their own desires, then sin and then inevitably death. So in Noah’s day, all of the hearts of the people had evil hearts—evil intentions, thoughts and then actions. Which prompted God to send the flood.
But it’s not hopeless! We are made in God’s image after all. Our hearts were created by a good God, the only good in this world. He is the one who has fashioned our hearts as it says in Psalm 33:15 and the one to whom our hearts can be fully devoted. But it’s not of our own strength. If it was, we’d be back to evil, where our hearts can be easily lured into sin.
But instead, by letting God’s able and willing hands hold it we are able to say like David did in Psalm 73:26: For my flesh and my hearts may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
So that’s our heart. Now how do we establish it? To establish something is to make firm or stable. Which as we just read makes perfect sense for us if we anchoring ourselves in God. In the beginning of time, in the Old Testament, the word establish was used when talking about covenants, the promises that God made with his people. It was made without any wishy-washy-ness (pretty sure I made that up, but you get it), no hesitancy or anything lukewarm.
It was done, true and forever. In the New Testament, in other letters like the one we’re looking at in James, it gives the same reminder: that we’re to be established, firm and true. But as we know our hearts can only follow truth if guided by God, we can only be established if we are established by God.
As it says in 2 Thess. 3:3: He will establish you and guard you against the evil one. He is the one who establishes us! We don’t have to worry about how we can make sure we’re steady. God is constantly steadying us, holding us against him that we know how to stand. We just have to let him.
So that was breaking it down. Now let’s look at the context:
The verses right before James 5:8, the start of chapter 5, v.1-6, is talking about the hearts of the rich. Those who are rich now without any regard to being rich later. There’s a difference. ((A difference that is more easily seen in two of the people Jesus encountered. The first is the rich ruler, in Luke 18, after being told by Jesus to sell everything to follow him, went away, and I quote “very sad for he was extremely rich.” Which is why Jesus then talked about it being easier for a camel to through the eye of a needle than a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.
God knows the comforts of this world are very alluring, all made with the intention to trick our hearts into thinking we are following what our hearts need instead of what our hearts want. But if we really spend time in the light, the Truth, and hold it up to all of these things masquerading as good, we’ll see the shadows that look so good turn out to be disgusting and soul-sucking evil. It’s feeding us what our hearts think they want instead of giving us what we need—which is all found within the light itself, the Truth of God’s Word, that brings us closer to our Creator.
And that’s what the second person who Jesus encountered did. In the next chapter, Luke 19, Zacchaeus, being a chief tax collector, didn’t come up to Jesus trying to follow the Law to the letter but miss the whole point of it changing our lives. He knew that he had done wrong to people. So when Jesus came to his house, Zacchaeus told Jesus his plan to give away half of what he had to the poor and give back to those he stole from four times over!
Which is why Jesus then said that salvation had come to that house. It might be easier for the camel to go through the eye of a needle, but nothing is impossible with God!))
Important words—with God.
In James, their focus is far from God. This is a description of them from v.4-5: they have lived on the earth in luxury and self-indulgence. They condemned and murdered the righteous person. They kept back wages by fraud. All of these things have pulled them away from God. Instead of letting it be a means to an end to use for God’s glory, they used it for their own glory.
Okay, now, being honest—how much of that can be said of us? We don’t have to be filthy rich (wow, that’s an interesting pun) to be called rich. We have material things and money to get what we need and moreover what we want. This isn’t just for those on the Forbes list. This is for us! We can just as easily put our faith into what we have instead of God. If we rely on these things, we’re just as guilty.
But this is what our riches end up looking like in the end as it says in v.2: these riches, now seen in the light, have rotted; our garments, moth-eaten; our gold and silver, corroded. None of them are things we’d now want. But the rich who choose only to be rich now because they’ve laid up treasure for themselves on earth as it says in v.3 end up with hearts completely divided.
Which is why it says in v. 5: You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. The rich who focus on themselves on earth are basically getting themselves ready for death! Their hearts lead them down the wrong path, toward evil and, as mentioned before in James 1, lured by their own desires leads to sin and then to death.
That’s why God is talking about establishing our hearts.
After warning us about going down other paths like the rich who trust in stuff, he guides us instead towards him. He knows we’re surrounded by all of these seemingly-good-looking things that grab our attention to lure us away. And he also knows he is the only one who can anchor us so we don’t drift away.
So he says, in v.7: Be patient therefore. Hold on! But what do we hold on for? It says the coming of the Lord. Everything looks very one-sided right now. It seems like the devil is always winning. Every battle seems to go to him. But God is always and already the winner of the war. At the end of time, he will come back. And he will bring his own, anchored to him, home with him.
As James is writing this, he calls us brothers and sisters, the family of God. That is a huge part of it all! We aren’t going through this alone! Of course we have God but we knew we’d need each other. To know we aren’t the only ones struggling to want to go down other paths. To know we aren’t the only ones holding up the light against darkness to realize the disgusting evil and instead see the Truth for what it is—glorious and beautiful. That is why we need the church.
So v.7: Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. And then after that it gives us a simple yet eloquent analogy: a farmer. It says See how the famer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and late rains. The farmer doesn’t sow the seed one day and expect whole fruit by the following day—it takes time! But not time for the farmer to sit back and pass the days away by going on vacation or mindlessly putting his feet up inside the house. Patience isn’t forgetting about it until it’s time. It’s putting our hope in it, living as if it changes our lives. The farmer puts his hope in the precious (it specifies that it’s precious!) fruit of the earth coming up and sustaining him. He is patient until the rains come—both early and late.
And then it is time.
So now the first part of our verse, v.8, that says: You also be patient. In the same way the farmer patiently waits, putting his hope in the precious fruit, so we patiently wait, putting our hope in the precious things that are to come in Christ.
Some of which he’s already given us! Eternal life doesn’t start after death, but as in says in John 17:3, eternal life is to know God, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent. We know what we’re waiting for! So, unlike the rich of the world only, we focus our riches to be of so much more and we patiently wait.
This is where we establish our hearts. Not fattening our hearts for the day of judgement to lead to death and a continued eternity without God. Not being antsy and anxious about what and when and how. But our hearts are immovable. Firm, stable, and established. Nothing can change our minds.
We will wait patiently because as it then says for the coming of the Lord is at hand. We know the end of the story! There is no hesitancy, no fickleness of heart—we deeply root our hearts in the knowledge that Jesus has come and is coming back. He has won over all of these temptations around us and by choosing him every day, we are part of his victory.
So that was the context before our verse—now for the context after.
Right after that, he reminds us not to grumble against one another, James again calling us brothers and sisters—family. We were already called that a couple of verses before to be patient, that we encourage each other as we wait. We can’t waste time picking at each other. We aren’t meant to be siblings that push each other’s buttons trying to cause trouble. We’re meant to protect each other and remind each other to look to our Father every day that we wait patiently until the day Jesus comes back.
Which is how v.9 ends: so that you may not be judge; behold the Judge is standing at the door. We don’t want to end up at the end of the time that we have patiently waited to have to show God all the bickering and evil ways that we pursued instead of standing firm and encouraging the family of God as we patiently waited to see him face to face.
God reminds us this isn’t anything that hasn’t been done before.
In v.10 he says: As an example of suffering and patience, brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. He again calls us family—that we are a part of something so much greater, surrounded by a great cloud of witness as it says in Hebrews 12:1. These prophets before us endured suffering instead of self-indulgence and luxury on earth. But they were patient, knowing that it was more than worth it in the end.
Which is why in v.11 Behold we consider those blessed who remained steadfast.
There is something powerful about those who stay steadfast. Warriors who stand tall in battle. Those are our heroes—those who didn’t let other things sway them but stayed focused on their purpose. That’s the example we have in the prophets and those of the family of God before us who haven’t let the world guide them elsewhere.
They stayed steadfast. And we call them blessed.
Like Job, as it talks about after the prophets. We’ve heard of his steadfastness, how he didn’t waver. He didn’t curse God or allow any of the things Satan threw at him to sway him. But, the secret of it comes not from ourselves, not from the prophets, and not from Job. Not one of them and not one of us have the ability to stay steadfast on our own. Which is the conclusion of the context in the end of v. 11: you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.
That is the key!!
Job didn’t stay steadfast because of any good or strength he had. As we find out at the end of Job, when he went to God with pomp and self-assuredness, he found himself instead jaw-droppingly awed at who God is, realizing God is so much more than the human brain can comprehend.
And the same with the prophets, even the one we may all think of the most, Elijah. In 1 Kings 19, after running from Jezebel, he plopped himself under a tree after walking in the wilderness all day and wanted to die. But God showed him his power, not in tearing wind or earthquake or fire but in a low whisper. God is the one who gives us strength. He is the one who makes us steadfast. There is nothing else and no one else as gentle and good and strong as God.
The purpose of the Lord isn’t to eagerly judge us at the end of time to find us wanting. Instead, the Lord is actually patient toward us, not wishing that any of us should perish, but that all should reach repentance as it says in 2 Peter 3:19 (which, going back, is how we are patient, in being made in the image of the one who is ever-patient with us!). His purpose in coming to earth is to bear witness to Truth as Jesus honestly told Pilate in John 18:37.
His purpose, again as it said in James 5:11, is made so by his compassion and mercy. Which we see over and over again. As Jesus, instead of getting frustrated with the crowds that were constantly around him, instead had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd as it says in Matthew 9:36.
And before God came to earth, Luke 1 talks unceasingly about his mercy- for those who fear him, for his servant Israel that he helped and remembered, as promised to our father. And then mercy, tender mercy, that allowed the sunrise from on high: Jesus. Our light, our guide and our peace.
So that was the verse in context. Now how does the beauty of this part of God’s Word change our lives:
Instead of taking the easy riches that are right in front of us, (James 5:1-6), we gather the riches that are in God by reading his precious words. For where our treasure is, there our hearts will be also. Matthew 6:21
Not only do we spend time in the riches of God, we are patient that we will see the fullness of who God is at his coming. Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. James 5:7
Instead of grumbling against each other, (James 5:9) the family of God, we encourage each other all the more as the day approaches to see God. Hebrews 10:25
We follow the example of those before us, the cloud of witnesses (Heb 12:1), those we consider blessed because they stayed steadfast. James 5:11.
And we do all this knowing that God’s purpose is bolstered by his compassion as our willing Shepherd and his mercy in coming for us. James 5:11
So, how do we establish our hearts?
We ready our hearts, not to follow evil, but good. We are established because we are always leaning on God. We don’t follow the comforts of this world, but we eagerly await seeing God at the end of it all. We wait patiently, following the steadfast example of those who trusted God before us. Because we know that we can rely on the compassion and mercy of God, his purpose.
In him, we establish our hearts.
Well, that’s it for this time. I pray this week is a wonderful one as you continually seek the Truth in God’s Word, that by its light we will know the right path to live as children of God- children that have an evergreen relationship with him.
Until the next one— same time, same place. See you soon :)
- Rebecca
James 5:1-11:
Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you. Be patient, therefore, brothers,[a] until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains. You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing at the door. As an example of suffering and patience, brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we consider those blessed who remained steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.
