On the night of our Lord’s betrayal and arrest, in those monumental hours before His trial and execution, He uttered some powerful and profound words to the Father in prayer. They are recorded for us in Luke 22:42–“Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” And while these words may be perplexing to us on many fronts, they should not be unexpected, for this is the very way that Jesus had instructed His Disciples to pray: “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). Jesus had taught His followers that all of life must be lived in humble submission to the will of God.

In that same place in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus had also spoken of God’s providence, a very closely related subject. You might recall His comforting words in the Sermon on the Mount in 6:25-34 where He taught that we should not be filled with anxiety concerning any aspect of our lives, but that we should trust in the Father’s tender care and faithful provision. Throughout the Bible we are told that God is in control, that He is good, that He is wise, and that His eternal plans and purposes shall never fail. And, given these realities, we have been called to live in each moment and in every circumstance as if they are indeed true!

The subjects of God’s will and of divine providence are in view in the words of James 4:13-17—our sermon passage for this coming Lord’s Day. It seems that there were some believers among those addressed in this letter who had forgotten these truths. They were living as if they, not the Lord, were in charge of their lives. You can hear the oozing spiritual pride and pomposity in their voices: “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit” (v. 13).

In response to this, as James characteristically does, he warns them sternly against such boastful “arrogance” (v. 16), and then instructs them in the proper way to speak and live: “Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that’” (v. 15).

This inspired instruction represents what we might call a profound ‘worldview shift.’ Contrary to human ‘wisdom,’ our lives are not left to the mercy of chance or human decisions. Rather, they are under the command of God. And this fact demands of us a change in perspective and in speaking—how we view our lives in all of their vast complexity, and how we speak of them in daily conversation as we go about our tasks.

So until Sunday, let’s all prayerfully reflect upon this passage and pray most fervently that the Lord will speak to us as we gather before Him.